Dudley's Daughter: Year Two
by NatteryakToad
Summary: It's Mia Dursley's second year at Hogwarts, and there's Quidditch tryouts, new classmates and even new classes. A next-gen fic, mostly based around Lily, Hugo and Louis, as well as my OC, Mia. Rose/Scorp. Sometimes.
1. Chapter One: Summer At The Potters'

Chapter One

Summer at the Potters'

"And it's Potter tearing down the pitch. She passes to other Potter, to Longbottom, who drops it, snatched up by other Longbottom, to Weasley, to Potter, intercepted by other Potter, passes to other other Potter, can Dursley save it? YES SHE CAN! And that's half time!"

Hugging the Quaffle to her chest, Mia Dursley landed on the ground in the orchard with the others.

"I'm so glad the Quidditch teams at school aren't like this!" Mackenzie Walter, known by his friends as Mac, who had been commentating, said, as they all walked back down the hill. "Too many people with the same surname – it gets so confusing."

Mia Dursley was enjoying the Summer holidays between her first and second years at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She'd spent most of the holidays with her parents, who were both Muggles, but had spent the last week with her best friend, Lily Potter, and her family. It was now Saturday and, that morning, all of Mia and Lily's friends had arrived to spend the weekend.

"Helloooooooo!" Lily called, the first one to run through the back gate and into the garden of her home in Godric's Hollow.

Her mum, Ginny Potter, looked up as nineteen teenagers crammed into her kitchen and jostled to get themselves a drink.

"Are you guys having a good time? – James-Potter-don't-you-even-think-of-summoning-that-lemonade-you-know-you-can't-use-magic-outside-of-school."

Lily's eldest brother James sighed. "I'm of age next month," he pouted.

"Well, next month you can use magic whenever you like," Ginny said firmly. "Until then, you can walk across the room and get it yourself."

James sighed. "Someone pass me the lemonade!" he called, and someone did.

"What are you all doing now?" Ginny asked.

"Going to play the other half of our Quidditch match," Albus, the Potter's middle child, told his mother. "It's half time now."

Ginny looked puzzled. "You don't get half time in Quidditch..." she said.

"We know that," Lily said. "But we had to find some way of ending it, since we're not playing with a Snitch, and so Rachel suggested to make it like Muggle football."

"Alright," Ginny smiled. "Well, don't be too long. I want to eat at seven, and I'm going to need your help to set the table."

"We won't be late," Albus promised, and they all trouped back outside again.

Mia walked back up to the orchard with Lily, Hugo and Louis. The four of them made a sort of quartet, although at school Louis was in Ravenclaw whilst the others were all Gryffindors.

"Right, everyone ready?" called Mac. "Mount your brooms!"

The fourteen players did so, and then kicked off hard from the ground and began to play again. Forty-five minutes later, they all landed, worn out.

Louis was singing a made up victory song, along with Kieran Finnigan, another Gryffindor in Mia's year.

"Well done, babe," Mia heard James' girlfriend Chlo say, going over to hug him. "You were great."

"Even though we lost." James grimaced.

"Yeah, well, I think that had more to do with Mia's amazing Keeping skill rather than any fault on your part. You and Lily were like a dynamic duo, tearing up the pitch... orchard..."  
James grinned and wiped his sweaty forehead on his girlfriend's shoulder, about which she didn't look best pleased.

A tall, pale, blonde boy joined in Louis and Kieran's victory song, the three of them dancing in out of the others.

"Scorp, quit being an idiot," a girl with bushy red hair said, grabbing him as he danced past her.

Scorpius grinned. "You like me better when I'm an idiot," he said, tipping her head back so he could kiss her.

Louis and Kieran stopped their song to make sick noises.

"Oh, grow up, you two," Rose sighed.

Louis poked his tongue out at his cousin. "Like you don't act childishly when you and Scorp are having a row," he said.

"Well, I don't act nearly as childishly as you do," Rose retorted.

Sensing an argument was about to start, Mia lead the way back to the Potter's house, with Mac, and two Hufflepuff girls, Cassie and Zoe, who opted to go with them.

"So, looking forward to being second years?" Mac asked the girls. He himself was going into his third year.

"Yeah!" Zoe said, and they all laughed. Zoe was enthusiastic about everything.

"You start third year subjects this year," Mac informed them.

"Why do we start third year subjects when we're only second years?" Mia asked.

"You do, like, taster sessions," Mac explained. "So when you're picking third year subjects you're making informed choices."

"What subjects are there?" Cassie asked quietly. Cassie was one of the quietest members of their group, dubbed 'the gang' by Mac, and so it was often easy to forget she was there.

Mac counted them off on his fingers. "Care of Magical Creatures, Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, Muggle Studies, Divination and Wizarding Political Studies."

"What are you taking?" Zoe asked.

"Care of Magical Creatures and Political Studies," Mac said. "Divination's a load of old rubbish, Arithmancy and Ancient Runes are hard, and I don't need Muggle Studies since my dad's a muggle."  
They reached the house and let themselves in through the back door.

"What can we do to-" Mac began, but broke off as he saw that Ginny had visitors. "Oh, sorry, Mrs Potter."

Mia recognised the visitors as Louis' oldest sister Victoire, and her boyfriend Teddy Lupin.

"Yes, of course you two can stay for dinner," Ginny was saying. "Obviously, it'll be rather different from the quiet family dinner you were expecting, but when you're feeding twenty one, two more really doesn't make any difference."

"What can we do to help?" Teddy asked.

"Could you and Vic set up the tables in the garden?" Ginny asked. She turned to Mia, Mac, Cassie and Zoe. "Are you guys back now?" she asked.

"Yeah," Mia said. "The others are just coming – we came on ahead since it looked like Louis and Rose were about to start an argument."  
As she said this, the others started spilling in through the back door. Ginny soon had them organised laying the big tables Teddy and Vic had put up in the garden,and helping with the dinner. By quarter past seven, they were all sat around the tables eating.

Mia was sat towards the middle of the table, in between Lily and Mac, who were carrying on a spirited argument across her about various Quidditch tactics and their legality, directly opposite James and Chlo, who were being thoroughly and disgustingly romantic.

As they were all finishing their main course, Teddy and Vic, sat at the far end of the table with Lily's parents called for silence.

"So... um..." Teddy said. "We weren't like expecting all these people here, and some of you don't even know us, so just ignore me, but... Vic and I have an announcement, and now seems as good a time as any."

"Ted, quit the preamble," Victoire said, tossing her silvery-blonde hair over her shoulders as Louis, sitting on Mac's other side, forcibly closed Mac's mouth for him, with a muttered,

"That's my sister you're gawping at."

Teddy grinned and put his arm around Vic's waist. "Last week, I asked Vic to marry me," he said.

"And I said yes," Vic said.

"Well duh," James muttered, grinning. "You'd hardly be telling us if you said no..."

Louis was the next to react. "You've been engaged a whole week, and you didn't even tell me!" he said.

Victoire smiled at her brother's indignation. "We only told Maman and Dad this morning," she said.

James leapt to his feet. "I propose a toast!" he said. "To Teddy and Vic!"

Everyone else got to their feet and echoed his toast.

By the time they'd finished eating, it was growing dark. Teddy and Victorie had left; Harry, Ginny, James, Chlo, Al, Rose and Scorp headed inside; and the gang retired to their tents.

When Lily's parents had agreed that she could have thirteen friends to stay for the weekend, the condition was that they weren't staying in the house. So, this morning, the friends had spent several hours erecting two tents in the girls all piled into their two man tent, which resembled a three-room flat inside. With no desire to go to sleep, they sat around in a circle on the floor and Lily started a game of Truth or Dare.

In the course of the next three hours, they discovered that Cassie had had an imaginary friend when she was younger, Alice and Frankie Longbottom both had a crush on Kieran Finnigan, and Zoe had attempted to copy all the answers off of the boy in front of her in their end-of-term History of Magic exam, stopped only by the anti-cheating spells on the quills they had to use.

The dares got wilder and wilder, including sneaking into the boys' tent, booby trapping the bathroom door and licking each others' toes. They only stopped when Ginny popped her head into the tent and threatened to join them if they didn't go to sleep.

* * *

The start of Mia's second year at Hogwarts :-) I've written the whole of "Year Two", and it's currently being Beta'd by my lovely Beta, triniroo, so more to follow soon! :-)


	2. Chapter Two: Diagon Alley

Chapter Two

Diagon Alley

After the crazy end to her week with the Potters, Mia was glad to go home and spend the last week before school started with her parents. In the middle of that week, she went with her parents and the Potters to Diagon Alley to buy school supplies.

First, they went to Gringotts bank, and whilst the Potters headed down to retrieve some gold from their vault, Mia's dad went to change some Muggle money into gold Galleons, silver Sickles and bronze Knuts. Mia thought her dad was a lot more confident in dealing with goblins than her mum, who hung back nervously. But then he had spent a year of his life living with wizards when he was younger, and he and his parents had to go into hiding during the Second War, so maybe that was it.

Their next stop was the bookshop, Flourish and Blotts. There weren't that many new books for second years, but rather more for James and Albus, who were going into their sixth and forth years respectively. Whilst the boys were finding their books, Lily and Mia wandered around the shop, looking at all the books for sale.

"Hey, look at this!" Lily said, stopping in the biographies section. There was an entire shelf of biographies of Harry Potter. Mia found it mildly disconcerting to have her dad's cousin's face staring down at her from several dozen books.

"There's one of your mum, too," Mia said, pointing. "And Hugo's parents."

"Lily! Mia! Where are you?" Harry called.

"In the biographies!" Lily called back, and presently both her parents and Mia's, as well as James and Albus, came into the back of the shop where they were.

"Uh oh..." Harry said. "Please tell me you haven't been reading any of those." He too looked rather disconcerted by his own face smiling down at him from the book covers.

Lily grinned. "Why, should I?"

"No," Harry said firmly. "Most of them are badly written, and at least 80% of it is speculation. Come on – we need to go to plenty of other shops."  
They bought new robes in Madam Malkins, Potions ingredients in the apothecary, and stocked up on tricks and jokes in Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes. Finally, Mia's parents took her to buy her birthday present – a broomstick.

The broom Mia really wanted was the one her friend Will, last year's head boy and Gryffindor Keeper, had – a Cleansweep Elite. It wasn't the fastest broom – that would be the Firebolt Blue - but it was the sturdiest, and the most receptive, which is what you needed when Keeping. However, she knew immediately upon entering the shop that her parent's couldn't afford 150 Galleons just for a birthday present.

In the end, after much umming and aahing and discussion with the young saleswizard, Mia chose a Comet 420, which Will had recommended highly in their lengthy discussions about brooms on their way back from training sessions last year.

Trying not to be disappointed that her broom wasn't a Cleansweep Elite, Mia headed home with her parents for the last few days of the Summer holidays.

"I'll go and find us a compartment whilst you say goodbye to your parents, and then you can save the compartment whilst I say bye to mine," Lily said to Mia at top speed, as soon as she came through the barrier onto Platform Nine and Three Quarters.

"Alright," Mia laughed. "And hello to you too."

"See you in a minute," Lily said. "Hey, I'll take Felix – all the other owls on the platform are already exciting him."

"Thanks," Mia said, gratefully relinquishing the cage containing her owl, who had ignored her insistence that he was meant to be nocturnal, and been awake for the entire journey to Kings Cross, and was now hooting excitedly.

"Have a great year, sweetheart," Mia's dad said, hugging her. "Good luck with the flying thing. See you at Christmas."

Mia's mum hugged her too, and then she climbed aboard the train and went looking for Lily.

"Hey, Mia!"

Mia wheeled around as she heard someone calling her name. Danielle Wood, a seventh year and the Gryffindor Quidditch captain, was sticking her head out of a compartment.

"Just advance notice," she said. "Keeper trials are next Saturday. Is that your new broom? What make is it?"

"Comet 420," Mia said, remembering it was the exact same model Danielle herself had.

"Good choice," Danielle grinned. "Well, I'll see you Saturday."

She went back into her compartment, and Mia continued down the train, looking for Lily. She eventually found her almost at the end of the train.

"I can't find anywhere," Lily said. "Every where's full."

"How can everywhere be full?" Mia asked. "There are heaps of people still on the platform."

"Well, okay, maybe everywhere isn't full," Lily conceded. "But no where's empty."

"What about here?" Mia asked, peering into the last compartment. It was empty apart from a small girl with long blonde pigtails who was intently reading a book. "It's just a first year."

"Okay," Lily said. "You save it, then, and I'll go say goodbye to my parents, and if I see any of the gang, I'll send them your way."

As Lily made her way back down the train, Mia settled herself in the compartment. She was soon joined by various members of the gang – Hugo, Louis, Zoe, Cassie, Mac, and finally Lily herself.

"Who's the kid?" Mac asked Mia in a very loud whisper, nodding over at the girl in the corner. Mia shrugged. The girl was obviously a first year, but she looked too small even for that. She glanced up as she sensed they were all looking at her, scowled, and went back to her book.

"Why doesn't she go sit with the other first years?" Zoe asked.

Hugo shrugged. "Maybe she doesn't know which ones are first years – it can be difficult to tell, and if you're too nervous to ask..."

The girl raised her head again. "You know, I can hear you," she said, and everybody noticed her foreign accent.

Mia got to her feet and walked over to the girl. "I'm sorry, we didn't mean to be rude," she said. "I'm Mia, and-"

"And I'm reading my book," the girl said, her eyes snapping back down to the book on her lap, which Mia noticed was the Standard Book of Spells, Grade Two.

Mac whistled as Mia walked back to join the group. "And you thought we were being rude," he said.

Cassie shushed him. "I'd be pretty intimidated if I were in a compartment with half a dozen second years," she said. "Cut her a bit of slack."

Mac stared at Cassie. "She speaks!" he exclaimed.

Cassie rolled her eyes at Mac, and Lily poked him.

"Alright, alright," Mac said, holding his hands up in mock surrender. "Leave me alone, you guys. So, who's up for a game of Exploding Snap?"

There was a general assent, and Mac fetched the cards. The game got more and more uproarious, with frequent explosions and accompanying shrieks. After a particularly big explosion, out of which Louis and Hugo came with blackened eyebrows, the friends heard a cough from the end of the compartment where the blonde girl sat.

"I'm trying to read," she said icily.

"Yeah, and?" Lily said hot-headedly, keeling up on her seat to get a better look at the girl. "We're playing Exploding Snap. Deal with it."

Mia pulled Lily back down onto the seat. "Ignore her," she said, dealing out the cards again.

As they traveled northwards, the landscape got darker and darker, and presently the lamps came on. The gang started packing away the cards, and getting into their school robes.

"D'you think we ought to tell her we're nearly there?" Lily asked, nodding over at the girl in the corner.

"Leave her to it, I would," Zoe said. "She'll figure it out soon enough."

But Lily ignored her. Kneeling up on her seat again, she called over to the girl, "Oi, Miss I'm-trying-to-read!"

The girl took no notice of her – she didn't even look up from her book.

"Oi!" Lily repeated, louder this time. "I'm talking to you!"  
This time the girl looked up.

"We're almost at school," Lily said irritably. "You might want to get changed."

The girl stowed her book away in her bag without a word.

"What, no thank you?" Lily demanded. "Shows how far being nice gets you."

"Lily, leave her," Hugo sighed. "C'mon, grab Venus and let's go – we're slowing down."

Still grumbling about the lack of thanks, Lily grabbed her owl's cage and joined the rest of them at the door.


	3. Chapter Three: The Term Begins

Chapter Three

The Term Begins

The train slowed to a stop, as the familiar sight of Hogsmeade station came into view. Students spilled onto the platform from all along the train, and Mia found herself caught in the slow moving crush of students off the platform. Just before they reached the fleet of horseless carriages which were waiting for them, Mia glanced back, wondering if the girl they'd been sharing a compartment with had heard the call of 'firs' years! Firs' years over 'ere,' but couldn't see her, so expected she had.

"Come on," Lily said urgently, tugging at Mia's arm. "Let's get a carriage before they all fill up."

Mia allowed herself to be pulled along, and she and her friends were soon seated in a carriage, which began to move off as soon as Lily closed the door behind them.

"And sausages – big fat juicy ones just oozing fat..." Hugo was saying to Louis.

"What are you two talking about?" Lily demanded.

"The feast," Louis grinned. "Hey, Hugo, don't forget the Yorkshire puddings."  
Lily sighed. "All you boys ever think about is your stomachs."

"That's not true," Hugo protested.

"Um, it kinda is," Mia said. "All the same, I am pretty hungry. I hope the sorting doesn't take too long."

"The sorting always takes too long," Mac complained. "I think they ought to just tell the first years to pick a table and be done with it."

They all laughed.

"Seriously, though," Lily said. "People couldn't just choose themselves a house – the whole point is that the hat looks inside your head and tells you where you belong."

"Does it?" Mac asked. "Or maybe people act like they belong in the house they're put in because they think they should. Maybe Gryffindors act brave because they think they should be, and Hufflepuffs work hard, not because they're naturally hardworking, but because they think they should be-"

"What about personal preference?" Cassie asked. They all stared at her. "The hat takes personal preference into account," she said quietly. "Well, it did for me."

"You mean..." Lily said. "You mean you chose to be in Hufflepuff? Who'd choose to be in Hufflepuff?"

"Who wouldn't?" Mac demanded, firing up. "What's wrong with Hufflepuff?"

"Well, if I had a choice between all the houses, I wouldn't choose Hufflepuff," Lily said. "That's all I'm saying." She sat back, folding her arms.

"But why not?" Mac demanded, not prepared to let the matter slide. "Why wouldn't you choose to be in Hufflepuff?"

The two of them looked like they were in the argument for the long haul, and the others soon started to ignore them and talked about other things. Louis started to tell them about the arrangements for Teddy and Victoire's wedding, which was scheduled for next summer.

Lily and Mac argued all the way up to the castle, only stopping when they reached the Great Hall and had to sit at their separate house tables.

Mia sat down at the Gryffindor table, in between Lily and Alexander Abercrombie. Opposite them were Lily's brother James and his two best friends: his cousin Fred, and Christopher Wood, younger brother of Danielle, the Gryffindor Quidditch captain.

"Yo, firsties," Fred said, by way of greeting.

Lily poked her tongue out at him. "We're second years now," she told her cousin.

"Well, you'll always be ickle firsties to me," Fred grinned.

"My sister's being sorted," Alexander said, turning his back on his best friend, Kieran Finnigan, to face Mia and Lily. "Ailie. She'll probably be first, because... Abercrombie."

"I hope that awful girl from the train isn't in Gryffindor," Lily said.

"What awful girl?" James asked, and Lily spent the next five minutes relating their train journey to him.

"You could have been a bit politer," James said tentatively, when she'd finished.

"So could she!" Lily said hotly.

"Yeah, but..." James began, breaking off as Professor Longbottom, their Herbology Professor, Head of House, and also Deputy Headteacher, entered the Great Hall, with forty or so first years following.

"That was us last year," Lily said in a whisper – the whole room had fallen silent.

"Shh," Mia hissed, as the mouth like rip near the brim of the faded, patched Sorting Hat opened, and the hat began to sing:

Another year, another set

Of students, not sorted yet

Most could say where they belong

But most I fear would get it wrong

You see, you all come with a thought

Of what qualities a house ought

To show, and you lament if you have not

That quality, well, it's a load of rot

You see, often you think I've put you in the wrong house

So you grumble and you grouse

But then you learn, and then you grow

And realise I was right, and so...

I might place you in Gryffindor

And you might grumble forevermore

'I'm not courageous, I'm not brave'

But I know deep down you're like a knave

You might end up in Hufflepuff

And protest that you're not up to snuff

'I'm not loyal, I don't work hard'

But I know that you're not really lard

Perhaps I'll put you in Ravenclaw

Although you protest, 'Why? What for?

'I have no brains!' – Oh yes you do!

There is no better fit for you

Or maybe you're a Slytherin

Alas, much to your chargrin

'Oh I'm not cunning, it's not for me!'

Oh yes it is, why can't you see?

For long before I was sewn

There was a saying, widely known

'Man looks on the outside'

Concerned with that which cannot hide

But I, the Hat, look deep within

Beyond the layers, thick or thin

I see what hides within your soul

And place you where you'll reach your goal

The rip closed, and the hall broke into applause.

Hugo, who was on Lily's other side, poked her, and said, "See, Mac was right. The hat does put you somewhere and then you act like you belong."

Mia shook her head. "I don't think that's what it was getting at," she said. "I think it's more that it looks deep inside us, and finds qualities we don't even know we have at that point in time. I mean look at Mac – you could hardly call him hardworking."

"Yeah, but-" Lily began, breaking off as silence fell and Professor Longbottom prepared to read the list of names.

"Abel, Ruth."

"I swear they get smaller every year," James muttered to Chris as the tiny girl with long dark plaits trotted up to the front of the group of first years, and sat on the stool, the hat blocking the hall from her view.

Several seconds passed, and then the hat shouted, "RAVENCLAW!" and the Ravenclaw table erupted with applause and cheers. Mia could see Louis moving over to give the new first year room to sit down.

"Abercrombie, Ailie," Professor Longbottom called, and a mousy-haired girl, unmistakably Alexander's sister, and, if it were possible, smaller than Ruth Abel, went forward and sat down on the stool.

"GRYFFINDOR!" the hat shouted, with only a moment's hesitation, and Ailie came to sit opposite her brother at the cheering Gryffindor table.

"Akers, Piers."

"Now that is not a first year," James said, rather more loudly than was strictly necessary, so that several people turned to look at him. The boy walking up to the sorting hat now was several heads taller than either of the girls who had gone before him, and easily taller than Zoe Davies, who was the tallest second year.

"RAVENCLAW!" the hat shouted, and Piers joined the Ravenclaw table.

As the sorting wore on, everyone started zoning out, unless they were waiting for a friend or relative to be sorted.

"Haines, Aimee."

Hugo yawned surreptitiously. "Are we still on the H's?" he asked.

Mia grinned.

"SLYTHERIN!"  
"Boo!" Lily said, as they watched Aimee Haines walking over to the Slytherin table, where Ilonka Kallous, Lily's sworn arch enemy, had moved over to make room for her.

"Hamel, Luci."

Lily poked Mia hard.

"Ow! What was that for?" Mia demanded, rubbing her arm.

"That's the I'm-trying-to-read girl from the train," Lily said.

Luci Hamel walked up to the sorting hat, sat down on the stool and placed the hat on her head.

"She better not be in Gryffindor," Lily said.

"Better Gryffindor than Slytherin, under Ilonka's influence," Mia said, glancing over at the Slytherin table. "Look, she's already grooming the first years into little Muggle-born haters."

"GRYFFINDOR!" the hat shouted, and Lily groaned.

"Great," she said, as Luci came and sat next to Ailie Abercrombie. "Wonderful."

"Shh," Mia said, as Professor Longbottom was glaring at them because they were talking too much.

As the sorting continued, the whispers of bored students grew louder.

"Surely they must be nearly done now," Hugo yawned, as Steven Walker became a Hufflepuff.

"I hope so," Mia said. "I'm getting really hungry now."

"Zabini, Asher."

"That must be the last one," Lily said, as the dark skinned boy sat down on the stool.

"Isn't that Brooke's brother?" Hugo asked. Brooke Zabini was Ilonka Kallous' second in command.

"Mmm," Mia agreed. "Or cousin or something – Zabini's not exactly a common surname."

"SLYTHERIN!" the hat shouted.

"Of course," Lily added.

"Why 'of course'?" Hugo asked. "Brothers and sisters, or cousins, can be in different houses."

"Yeah, but usually..."

Professor McGonnagal, the headmistress, got up to speak, and James groaned. "I'm starving," he said to no one in particular, rather loudly, and Professor McGonnagal heard him.

"I was going to speak to you on a few matters, but, as my godson has so vocally reminded me, it's high time you all had something to eat. What I have to say can keep until you're all fed and watered." She clapped her hands, and the platters and dishes in front of them filled with food.

Everyone started eating. James was still bright red and Fred and Chris laughing themselves silly at his embarrassment.

"Trust you," Fred grinned.

"I could just as easily have been any of you," James said indignantly. "We're all starving."

"But it wasn't," Chris grinned. "It was you."

"At least I got us dinner quicker," James protested. "She probably would've ignored anyone else, but because I'm her godson..."

The chatter grew louder and louder as students finished eating, and eventually Professor McGonnagal rose to speak.

"I want to extend a warm welcome – or in many cases, welcome back – to all students and staff," she said. "Now that we're all fed and watered-" she looked meaningfully at James, who went bright red again, amidst laughter from his fellow students "-I have a few start of term notices."

"I hope it is a few," Lily muttered. "I want my bed."

"I would like to welcome Mr Carter as our new caretaker," Professor McGonnagal continued. "As I'm sure you are aware, Mr Carter has been working under Mr Filch for the past few years, and now as he has been obliged to retire, Mr Carter will replace him. And I'm sure you would all like to join me in showing your appreciation for the over fifty years of service that Mr Filch has given to the school."

A very half-hearted round of applause followed; the old caretaker was not well liked in the school and, although Mia and her friends had not had very many dealings with him, they had heard plenty from their parents or older siblings.

"Before he retires, Mr Filch would like me to remind you of one or two things," Professor McGonnagal said. "Namely that magic is not allowed in corridors, and the forest in the grounds, colloquially known as the Forbidden Forrest, is just that: forbidden."

James, Fred and Chris grinned at each other. Everyone knew that the forest being forbidden had never stopped them.

"And now," Professor McGonnagal said. "I think it is time for bed. Prefects, please show the first years where to go. Goodnight."

The hall roared to life as students got to their feet, and half an hour later, Mia was curled up in her four-poster bed, happy to be back at Hogwarts.


	4. Chapter Four: Luci

Chapter Four

Luci

The next morning at breakfast, Professor Longbottom walked up and down the Gryffindor table, handing out timetables. Being before either Lily or Hugo alphabetically, Mia got her timetable first. She groaned when she saw it.

"Double Duncan first, and then History of Magic," she told the others.

Professor Duncan was their Transfiguration teacher, notorious for being unfair. He'd given the three of them detention last year for a variety of jumped up charges. As for History of Magic, it was universally agreed to be the most boring subject Hogwarts offered, and no one had taken it beyond OWL for over a hundred years.

After breakfast, the three of them met Louis in the Entrance Hall, and headed up to the fifth floor and Transfiguration.

"Why's Duncan even teaching, if he hates kids so much?" Louis asked no one in particular.

"Mmm," Lily agreed. "He's so unfair to everyone – it's not even like he just favours his own house... what house was he even in at Hogwarts?"

"Ravenclaw," Louis said glumly. "But he's as unfair to us as he is to anyone else."

"Sure that means he's equally fair to everyone," James said, suddenly coming up behind them and making them jump.

"Where did you come from?" Lily demanded.

"Did you apparate?" Hugo asked.

"No, little Hugey," James said, with a condescending smile. "Because firstly, as your mother would be reminding us if she were here, you can't apparate inside the Hogwarts grounds. And secondly, even though I come of age next week, we don't start Apparition lessons until October."

"So where did you come from?" Lily persisted.

"Shortcut," James said, nodding at a tapestry halfway back down the corridor. "So, who's so unfair they're actually fair?"

"Duncan," Louis said.

"Ah," James said knowingly. "Git."

They all giggled.

"Anyway, you ought to hurry up, shouldn't you?" James said. "Don't want to be late on your first day."

"Where are you going?" Lily asked her brother.

"Common room," James grinned. "I've got two frees now. Virtue of being a sixth year."

"Lucky," Lily said.

"I bet normally you'll have heaps of work to do then," Hugo said.

"Maybe," James shrugged. "Maybe not. Anyway, see you, kids."

They parted at the foot of a stair case, the four friends turning down the Transfiguration corridor, and James continuing up towards the 7th floor.

"We are going to be late," Mia said, looking at her watch.

The three of them quickened their pace, dodging a lime green paper aeroplane which was careering down the corridor, and tacked onto the end of the file of students which was making its way into the Transfiguration classroom. They were the last ones in, and therefore had to sit in the front row.

"Guess who's going to get picked on today," Lily sighed, rolling her eyes as Professor Duncan sat down behind his desk, directly in front of Lily and Hugo.

Before Professor Duncan could speak, there was a knock at the door, and Professor Longbottom came in, followed by Luci Hamel, the small blonde girl from the train.

"What's she doing here?" Lily hissed, right in Mia's ear.

"I don't know," Mia hissed back, wiping Lily's spit off her earlobe.

They soon found out.

"Professor Duncan, may I have a word with Mia?" he asked.

Professor Duncan nodded his assent, and Professor Longbottom gestured for Luci to sit down in the spare seat beside Mia.

"Mia, this is Luci," Professor Longbottom said. "She's nominally a first year, but she will be taking some classes with the second years. Luci is from Switzerland, and is only here for a year whilst her father works in London. In order for her to keep up with her year at home, she needs to take some classes with you, and some with the first years. So she will be with you for Transfiguration, Potions, Charms and Herbology. I'd like you to look after her."

"Of course, Professor," Mia said, and turned and smiled at Luci, who didn't smile back.

Professor Longbottom left the classroom, and Professor Duncan stood up. "Right," he said. "Interruptions aside, let's begin."

Throughout the double period, Mia tried to look after Luci, to engage her in conversation, but Luci remained stubbornly quiet, answering her questions politely but shortly, and answering any non-essential chatter with a curt,

"I'm trying to work."

"She's impossible!" Lily said emphatically at break, once they had delivered Luci to Ailie Abercrombie. "Why can't she just be with all the first years, like she's supposed to?"

"Because she has to stay in line with the other people in her year back in Switzerland, like Professor Longbottom said," Mia told her.

"Well that's stupid," Lily said. "Why did her dad even have to come to work in England, anyway?"

"Who knows?" Hugo shrugged.

"Well, anyway, she's a nightmare," Lily said. "She doesn't even try to be friendly, so I don't know why we even try."

"It must be hard for her, though," Mia reasoned. "Coming to a new country, speaking a different language – what language do they speak in Switzerland?"

"I think it's French..." Lily said.

"Yeah, but she sounds German," Mia mused.

"Don't they speak Swiss in Switzerland?" Hugo asked.

Louis rolled his eyes. "There's no such language as Swiss," he said.

"Well, anyway," Mia said. "Whatever language she normally speaks, it isn't English. And then instead of one group of people to get to know – the first years – she's got us too, and we already know each other. I don't blame her for being shy."

"She's not shy," Lily said. "Like a block of ice is more like it."

Hugo grinned at the metaphor.

"Shut up," Lily laughed, hitting him playfully. "Well, at least we're rid of her for now."

"Yeah, but Binns..." Louis sighed.

Professor Binns was the only ghost teacher. He spent all their lessons droning on about the long distant past, and hadn't even let his death get in the way of his everlasting lectures.

Slowly, the four of them made their way up to the History of Magic classroom, dragging it out as long as possible. Eventually, however, they had to go in, and claim their usual seats at the back of the classroom, where it was usually fairly safe to carry out a whispered conversation, or a boredom busting game of Noughts and Crosses.

"Binns is late," Louis said, looking at his watch.

"And you're complaining why?" Lily demanded.

"I'm not; I was just stating," Louis said.

Suddenly, Derek Downer, a Ravenclaw boy who was sitting in the front row, screamed. Professor Bins was floating through the blackboard.

"Good morning, class," he said, in his usual monotone.

"Good morning, Professor Binns," they all chanted back, imitating his monotone and aware that the excitement was over. Indeed, Professor Binns' entrance was definitely the high point of the lesson; for the next forty five minutes, he droned on and on about witch burning in the middle ages.

Mia played 43 games of Noughts and Crosses with Lily. Then she stared out of the window and imagined she was flying in and out of the trees in the Forbidden Forrest. Quidditch tryouts were on Saturday. What if she didn't make the team? She'd written to Will to tell him about her new broom and also to share her fears. She'd received his reply the day before she came back to school – he believed in her, and so did Danielle. All she had to do was play her best on Saturday, and hope for the best.

"Come on, Mia."

Mia became aware of Lily tugging on her arm.

"Come on," she said. "The lesson's finished – let's get out of here."

Mia packed up quickly and followed Lily and Hugo downstairs to the dungeons.

"This day's already gone on forever, and it's not even lunchtime," Lily sighed.

"At least we'll be able to actually do something in Potions," Hugo said. "I hate just sitting around doing nothing all lesson."

"Yeah, but we'll have her with us again," Lily sighed. "Luci I-don't-want-to-be-friends-with-anyone Hamel."  
"Cut her some slack, Lil," Hugo sighed.

"No, I won't!" Lily said hotly. "Maybe if she even tried to be friendly, but... And it's alright for you – you won't have to sit with her, but I guess me and Mia will have to have her at our table."

They reached the dungeon where Potions was held, and queued up outside with the rest of the class. Hugo wandered away to join Alexander Abercrombie and Kieran Finnigan. Lily glared at him, and then at Luci, and then stalked off to stand with Zoe and Cassie, the two Hufflepuff girls who Lily and Mia always sat with in Potions. Glumly, Mia stuck to Luci's side.

"What lesson did you have just now?" Mia asked.

"Defence Against the Dark Arts," Luci said woodenly.

"What did you think of it?" Mia asked.

"It was alright," Luci said. Mia waited for her to expand, but she didn't.

"Well, I've just had History of Magic," Mia said unperturbed. "I guess you've still got that to look forward to. Professor Binns is the only ghost teacher, but he's sooo boring."

Luci consulted her timetable. "I have History of Magic seventh period," she informed Mia.

"Have fun," Mia grinned.

Professor Cooke opened the dungeon door and beckoned them all inside. Mia led Luci over to their usual table, where Lily, Zoe and Cassie were already sitting down.

"Nick a chair from that table and shove it on the end here," Mia told her.

"Nick?" Luci queried.

"Kinda like steal, borrow," Mia said, sitting down next to Lily, who was rolling her eyes, as Luci did as she was told.

"Cut her some slack, Lily," she muttered. "It's not her fault she doesn't understand some of the weirder points of the English language."

"Well, maybe she shouldn't have come here if she doesn't understand English," Zoe said. Lily had obviously filled her and Cassie in on who Luci was.

"Stop it, all of you!" Cassie said. "I can't believe you're all being so mean about her! Less than six months ago, I couldn't read, and that didn't mean you looked on me as any less. Why should it matter if English isn't her first language? You're acting like Ilonka and her gang, acting like she's less of a person for what language she speaks or where she's from."

"But it's not just that, she-" Lily began, but Cassie cut her off.

"Shut up!" she said. "Just shut up, Lily!"

Luci carried the chair over to the table, and sat down on the end, in between Mia and Cassie.

"Hi Luci," Cassie said. "I'm Cassie."

Luci gave her a curt nod, and Lily nearly fired up again at her cool treatment of an attempt to be friendly, but Zoe wisely engaged her in conversation. When they came out of Potions forty-five minutes later, Lily shot a contemptuous glance at Luci, linked her arm through Hugo's, and sped away to the Great Hall and lunch, so that when Mia reached the Great Hall, Luci in tow, Lily and Hugo were already eating, at the far end of the Gryffindor table.

"I've got Modern History of Magic straight after lunch," Mia told Luci. "So you must have something with the first years."

Mia spotted Ailie Abercrombie sat with her brother, halfway up the table, and walked over, left Luci with them, and then joined Lily and Hugo. The two of them were discussing Quidditch with a vim, and Mia decided not to bring the subject of Luci up, and instead joined in.

By the time they left the Great Hall for Modern History of Magic, Lily was pretty much her usual self. They filed into Professor Nilsson's classroom, Louis joining them in their usual seats in the third row.

"I wonder what we're doing this year," Louis mused as the room filled up around them.

"Well, whatever it is, it's bound to be something more interesting than what Binns teaches," Mia yawned.

"Anything's better than what Binns teaches," Hugo agreed. "Although I expect it's more about the teacher rather than the subject matter – I reckon Binns could make even the Battle of Hogwarts sound boring."

"Probably," Mia agreed.

Professor Nilsson entered the room just then, and the class fell silent. It wasn't a fear-fueled silence, unlike the one which perpetuated Professor Duncan's classroom. In Professor Nilsson's classes, they were quiet because it was the easiest way to hear what he had to say, which tended to be interesting.

"Good afternoon, Second Years," Professor Nilsson said briskly. "Now then, this year we will be focussing on the first Wizarding war, and Voldemort's initial rise to power."

"Yay, grandparents!" Lily said excitedly, a little more loudly than she'd been intending to.

Professor Nilsson laughed. "Yes, Lily – many of your grandparents were growing up during Voldemort's initial rise to power."

Derek Downer, the tall, thin Ravenclaw boy who'd screamed in Binn's class sighed. "It's alright for some people – but some of us are muggle born. My grandparents weren't around during the first war."

"Yes they were," Lily said, turning round in her seat to look at Derek. "Not involved in it, maybe, but they were still alive anyway."

"Well duh, Lily," Louis said, rolling his eyes.

"Anyway," Professor Nilsson said, his voice cutting through the growing chatter. "We'll start with a basic timeline, so prepare to take notes."


	5. Chapter Five: Muggle Studies

Chapter Five

Muggle Studies

"What've you got now?" Lily asked Louis as they filed out of Modern History of Magic.

"Herbology with the Hufflepuffs," Louis sang.

"Why are you singing?" Hugo asked him.

Louis shrugged. "Which means," he continued,"you've got something with the Slytherins."

"Charms," Lily sighed, "with Ilonka. And Luci. Could this day get any worse?"

"Hey, Modern History wasn't half bad," Mia protested.

"No, but the rest of today was," Lily said. "And we've still got two lessons until dinner."

They said goodbye to Louis on the second floor as he continued downstairs, and Lily, Mia and Hugo queued up outside the Charms classroom. Mia stood dutifully by Luci's side, and Lily joined the other second year Gryffindor girls – Alice and Frankie Longbottom and Rachel Wilson. Hugo hovered for a minute, and then went to stand with Alexander and Kieran.

Luci was standing with her bag at her feet, reading the Standard Book of Spells, Grade Two. Mia decided it probably wasn't best to try and engage her in conversation, so instead watched Lily giving Ilonka evils across the corridor.

Ilonka Kallous was Lily's sworn arch-enemy. The Slytherin second year headed up a gang of girls, or 'sheep' as Mac liked to call them, and she and Lily had been in several small scale duels the previous year, culminating in them both, plus Mia and Hugo, getting detention from Professor Duncan.

Today, the two of them seemed content giving each other evils, but Mia couldn't imagine it lasting. Nobody apart from her own special gang particularly liked Ilonka – she was a pure blood supremacist with a distain for anyone she viewed as inferior – but Lily, with her extremely short temper, was always the first to be offended by Ilonka, even if she wasn't doing anything.

Tiny Professor Flitwick, their Charms teacher, opened the door of the classroom and invited them inside with a bow. Mia and Luci were the last two into the classroom because Luci insisted on reading to the end of her paragraph before putting her book away, and Mia saw that Lily had sat herself deliberately in between the Longbottom twins. Mia and Luci ended up sitting in the front row with two Slytherins: Ruby McLaggan and Theo Nott.

"Hi Mia," Ruby said shyly. The Gryffindor second years weren't exactly on speaking terms with the Slytherins, but it was universally agreed that Ruby and Theo were Alright.

"Hi Ruby," Mia returned. "Good holidays?"

"Yeah," Ruby nodded. "We went to Spain for two weeks, and it was sooo hot."

"This is Luci," Mia told Ruby and Theo. "She's only here for a year, and she's kind of half a first year and half a second year."  
"Hi Luci," Ruby said.

"Guten nachmittag," Luci said woodenly.

"Can't you speak English?" Ruby asked.

"Of course," Luci said.

Professor Flitwick climbed up onto the stack of books which enabled him to see over his desk, and then started the lesson. He told them that for the first week of term they'd be reviewing what they did last year, and soon had them practicing spells in pairs.

Mia found she was slightly rusty after a long summer – Charms was the first lesson in which they'd been doing actual spellwork – Professor Duncan had had them doing theory for the whole double period. Luci, however, appeared to be a natural, and was soon levitating objects all over the place.

"So, when do you start school in Switzerland?" Mia asked Luci halfway through the lesson, not really expecting an answer beyond 'I'm trying to work'.

To her surprise, Luci replied, "When you are eight. But it is mostly reading and writing and history and things like that for the first two years. Then when you are ten, you start actual magic."

Mia thought that was probably the longest she'd ever heard Luci talk. "But you take Defence Against the Dark Arts with the first years?" Mia queried. "So you don't start that at ten in Switzerland?"

Luci shook her head. "The teachers do not think children should learn about Dark Magic. No Defence Against the Dark Arts until we are twelve. Wingardium Leviosa!"

Sensing that Luci had finished talking, Mia returned to her work as well.

"Luci's not all bad, you know," Mia told Lily as they climbed a staircase, after pointing Luci in the direction of Professor Binn's classroom. "We actually had a conversation in Charms."

"Mmm," Lily said non-committally.

"So, Muggle Studies," Louis said as Lily and Mia caught up with him and Hugo. "Wonder what we'll learn."

"Probably they'll just give a course overview," Mia said.

"Yeah," Hugo agreed. "And tell us all how brilliant Muggle Studies is – the whole point of doing it this year is to try and persuade us to take it next year, isn't it?"

They reached the sixth floor classroom where Muggle Studies was held, tacking onto the end of the line going into the classroom – they'd got behind the rest of the class when they stopped to direct Luci.

Being the last in, the four of them found themselves in the front row, along with two Ravenclaw boys: Derek Downer and Andy Cattermole. The second years only knew the Muggle Studies teacher, Professor Reuben, by sight, and so didn't really know what kind of teacher she'd be.

"Good afternoon, class," she said briskly.

"Good afternoon, Professor Reuben," the class chanted back.

"Right, first thing's first: how many of you are Muggle-born?" she asked.

Mia raised her hand, along with Derek, Rachel Wilson, and two other Ravenclaws.

"And how many of you have one Muggle parent and one magical parent?"

Five people, including Alexander, raised their hands.

"Okay, so half of you have two Wizarding parents," Professor Reuben said. "Right, I'd like you all to get into groups of four, with one Muggle-born and one person with one Muggle parent in each group."

Chatter broke out as people started forming groups.

"We can't all go together," Lily said, looking around. "We don't have someone with one muggle parent."  
"I could pretend?" Hugo suggested.

Louis rolled his eyes. "Everyone knows who your parents are, Hugo."

"Hey, Mia-and-someone, do you want to come with us?" Kieran asked; he and Alexander were stood in front of the front row."

"Sure," Lily said. "See you, suckers," she said to Hugo and Louis, as she and Mia followed Alexander and Kieran to spare seats at the back.

"Right!" Professor Reuben said. "I'm going to bring each group a set of cards. Some cards have pictures of muggle objects, some have the names of those objects, and some have descriptions of what they're used for. All you need to do is match the object to its name and description."

"But that'll be easy," a Ravenclaw girl said. "I'm muggle born – I'll have all of that stuff at home."

"Ah, but you won't be allowed to help straight away," Professor Reuben explained. "The two students who don't have muggle parents will have five minutes to match up the cards, and then the other two members will have 30 seconds to make any corrections they deem necessary."

"30 seconds?!" Hugo said, from the other side of the classroom. "That's not very long!"

"Indeed, but if you all had enough time, where would the fun be?" Professor Reuben laughed. "The winning team will be the one which the most correct matches, and they will each get a chocolate frog as a prize. Now-"

"But people could cheat!" Alice Longbottom said suddenly. "They could nod or shake their heads, or pull faces, or something."

"Damn you, Alice – that's just what I was going to get them to do," Louis sighed.

Professor Reuben grinned. "I've thought of that too," she said. "So, to ensure fair play, I will be putting the Full Body-Bind on each of the team members with muggle parents. Now, you have one minute to discuss strategy."

Mia turned to Lily and Kieran, an idea already forming in her head. "Why don't you two put ones you're more confident about on this side of the table, and the ones you're less sure of on this side – then if we don't have time to check them all at least we'll have done the ones you're less sure of."

"Okay," Lily nodded.

Around her, Mia could hear Hugo and Louis disagreeing on whether singing during the 30 seconds of checking would end up distracting their team-mates more than the rest of the class, and Derek Downer trying to tell the rest of his team everything there was to know about the Muggle world in under a minute.

"And," Alexander said. "Make sure you talk loud enough for us to hear, so we know what you're putting with what, so we get a head start on what needs changing."

"Right, time's up!" Professor Reuben called. "Silence now, and I'm coming round to Body-Bind you – I'd advise you lay on the floor unless you want to fall over."

There were stifled giggles as half the class lay themselves down on the floor. Mia and Alexander strategically positioned themselves so that they were close enough to hear Lily and Kieran sorting the cards.

Professor Reuben walked around the classroom, pointing her wand at each student in turn and saying 'Petrificus Totalus'. At the back of the classroom, Mia and Alexander were the last to be Body-Bound. Mia had never had the Full Body-Bind placed on her before, and it was a decidedly odd sensation. Suddenly, her whole body went stiff as a board, and Mia found she couldn't move a muscle. She listened keenly – all she could see was the ceiling – and heard Professor Reuben's footsteps returning to the front of the classroom.

"Right, you have five minutes. Off you go," she said.

It was a very strange five minutes for Mia, lying on the floor and listening to the shrieks of 'What on earth would you use that for?' and 'Tele-phone and tele-vision... d'you think those are the same kind of thing?... which of the pictures look the same?' and trying to pick out Lily and Kieran's voices from the noise.

Eventually, Professor Reuben shouted, "Time's up! Step away from the cards!"

"Alice! You're standing on Rachel!" Mia heard Frankie Longbottom say, followed by Alice's,

"Oh, sorry, Rachel!"  
"Right, I'm coming round to remove the Body-Bind, but no one is allowed to move until I say so."

Mia waited as Professor Reuben made her way around the classroom, muttering the counter-curse. Finally it was Mia's turn, and she physically felt the spell lift, suddenly aware that she could move again.

Professor Rueben called, "Okay, you have thirty seconds... ready, set... GO!"

Mia leapt up, along with half the class. At the next table, Derek Downer had jumped up with such enthusiasm that he jogged the table and half a dozen cards came cascading to the floor, amid shrieks from his team-mates.

Mia herself concentrated on correcting Lily and Kieran's assertion that a microwave was in fact called a post box ('It's box shaped!' Lily protested), and that a toaster was used for making things louder. She'd just finished one column of 'unconfidents' – Alexander was doing the other – and was glancing across at the 'confident' column, which was headed up by a picture of a plug, correctly named and labelled with 'used for connecting electronic devices to power', when Professor Reuben called for time.

When all the points were counted up, Mia's team had come out victorious, with 17 correct matches out of 20, and the four of them went off to dinner, munching their chocolate frogs.


	6. Chapter Six: Useless and Useful

Chapter Six

Useless and Useful

After that, the second years were unanimously agreed that Muggle Studies was the best subject ever, and Professor Reuben was the best teacher, even surpassing Professors Cooke and Longbottom, who were generally agreed to be the students' favourite teachers. Everyone was really excited about starting the other third year subjects, but they had to wait until Thursday before they had the next two – Divination and Care of Magical Creatures.

"Mum says Trelawney's an old fraud," Hugo told Lily, Mia and Louis as they four of them headed up to the very top of the castle, where Professor Trelawney taught, on Thursday afternoon, after a particularly gruelling Transfiguration lesson with Professor Duncan.

"Well, I'm looking forward to a sleep," Lily yawned. "My dad says the classroom's so warm and stuffy you can just drop right off... and the old bat won't even notice."

They soon reached the landing where the rest of the class were waiting – once again the four of them had got behind as they stopped to point Luci in the right direction of her next class.

"So, where's the classroom?" Mia asked, looking around. She couldn't see a door anywhere.

"Up there," Hugo said, pointing. Mia looked up and saw a trap door in the ceiling.

"She lowers down like a rope ladder," Lily explained.

"And then we ascend into her lair," Louis grinned.

As he spoke, the trap door opened and a rope ladder was lowered down. A silvery voice, said,

"Come on up, dears."

The second years all looked at each other, none of them wanting to be first. Eventually Dove, a Ravenclaw girl with black hair and soft grey eyes, sighed. "I'll go first," she said, and started to climb the ladder. Her friends followed her, and, by degrees, the rest of the class did too.

Professor Trelawney's divination classroom was dimly lit by candles and firelight. The low spindly-legged tables were surrounded by stools, poufs and cushions. Mia sat around a table with Lily, Hugo and Louis. Professor Trelawney waited until they were all seated, and then took up her seat in an armchair at the front.

"Good afternoon, class," she said, in tones which suggested she'd just announced the world would end tomorrow, or something equally dramatic. "Many of you, I fear, are not destined to continue this esteemed subject into your third year, which, although disappointing... is unavoidable."

"Not if she makes the lessons interesting, it's not," Lily said in a stage whisper. Hugo, Mia and Louis all giggled, as Professor Trelawney glared coldly at Lily, and then her expression softened when she realised who it was.

"Lily, my dear," she said. "Your father, of course, was one of my best students."

Lily actually laughed out loud at this. "He got a P at OWL, after you'd spent three years predicting his untimely death."

"And then changed your mind and said he'd live to a ripe old age, become Minister for Magic and have twelve children," Mia grinned –she'd heard the story several times.

"And I am proving to be right!" Professor Trelawney said haughtily, rising from her chair. "He is still alive, is in the position which the current Minister used to hold, and there is still time for more children."  
"My mum would disagree," Lily grinned.

Professor Trelawney turned her back on them and started pacing as she spoke. "It takes talent to be a true Seer, and it is not something that can be learnt from textbooks or tested by examinations-"

"Why are we learning it, then?" Louis asked the others in a whisper.

"Nevertheless," Professor Trelawney said, continuing as though Louis had not spoken, although it was clear from her tone that she had heard him. "I will endeavour to teach, to impart what I know, and make you familiar with some of the techniques..."

"She does talk a load of rubbish," Mia whispered into Lily's ear, pleased by the way her friend giggled at the comment.

"I told you she's an old bat," Lily whispered back.

Professor Trelawney spoke for the next forty minutes, about how pointless Divination was as a subject, or so it seemed to Mia. She told them multiple times how she couldn't expect any of them to learn anything in their lessons with her.

Towards the end of the lesson, Derek put up his hand and asked, "So... Divination's basically fortune telling, right?"

At this, Professor Trelawney visibly exploded. "The divine art of Divination is nothing like poorly crafted Muggle fortune telling!" she said indignantly. "When they tell fortunes, Muggles rely on tricks and slights of hand. There is more true Seer blood in...in my little finger than in every Muggle fortune teller put together."

The bell rang just then, and the class all hurried down the rope ladder before Professor Trelawney could say anything else. Mia walked through the castle with Lily, Hugo and Louis. Their next lesson was Care of Magical Creatures, so they had to go all the way down to the Entrance Hall, and out into the grounds.

"I can't believe Derek said that!" Lily giggled as the four of them pushed aside a tapestry and embarked on a shortcut. "Wasn't the old bat mad?"

"Fuming," Hugo agreed with a grin.

"I thought you guys were exaggerating when you said she was mad, but now I've seen it for myself..." Mia said.

"Well, I for one won't be taking Divination next year," Louis said. "I don't think I've ever heard rubbisher rubbish in my life."

"Rubbisher rubbish?" Lily giggled.

"Looks like someone hasn't got a very good grasp of the English language," Mia said, joining in on the teasing.

"If you think his spoken English is bad, you should look at his writing," Hugo added.

"What's this, everyone gang up on Louis day?" Louis protested. They all laughed.

"I could tell your fortune," Mia said, a sudden idea seizing her. "Muggle style, of course."

"Really?" Hugo asked, but the others looked sceptical.

"Sure," Mia said. "After dinner in the House Common Room. All I need is a pack of cards – exploding snap ones will do."

They soon reached the Entrance Hall, and pushed open the huge double doors in order to head out into the grounds. The September air was still as warm as Summer, which Mia didn't imagine would last, at least not up here in Scotland. The four of them headed down to the hut at the edge of the Forbidden Forrest, where Hagrid lived. As well as being the Hogwarts gamekeeper, Hagrid was the Care of Magical Creatures Professor, and taught all of his lessons in the grounds near his hut.

The other Gryffindor and Ravenclaw second years were already forming a group near Hagrid. Lily, Hugo, Mia and Louis joined them as Hagrid surveyed the group.

"Righ' is tha' all 'a yeh?" he asked. "Then I suppose we ha' better make a start. This year, you've go' abou' fifteen or so lessons wi' me, and we're goin' a' spend each one on a diff'ren' magical creatures wi' a diff'ren' quality – yeh know, so this week I've chosen a creature tha's useful. An' I'm gonna ge' someone teh pick a quality an' then I'll find a creature tha's got it. So..." he looked around the class. "Who shall I pick teh choose the quality for th' next creature? How ab'at someone I don't know? Wha's your name?" he asked, pointing at Dove Ackerley, the girl who'd been first to enter Professor Trelawney's 'lair' in Divination."

"Dove," she said.

"Well then, Dove, if yeh could have a think durin' the lesson an' then at the end, tell meh what quality yeh want the creature we study nex' lesson teh have have.

"So, today, I decided we shou' study a creature tha's useful," Hagrid said. "So... can anyone tell meh wha' a niffler is?"

"Oooh!" Lily said excitedly. "James and Fred and Chris put nifflers in Professor Duncan's office last year."

"And that's why we didn't win the Quidditch cup," Hugo reminded her soberly.

"Tha's right, they did steal 'em nifflers..." Hargrid said. He reached into a crate which stood beside a patch of freshly dug earth. "This," he said, lifting a furry black creature with a long snout out of the crate, "is a niffler."

"Oooh, they look so cuddly!" Dove squealed.

Hagrid laughed. "I wouldn' exac'ly call 'em cuddly," he said. "But they_ are_ useful. Niffler's love gold," Hagrid said. "Or any kind o' treasure, really. Let 'em loose where there's treasure, an' you've got your own little treasure hunter."

"It's like a live metal detector," Derek said, and Mia agreed.

"So," Hagrid continued. "I want yeh to ge' into pairs, an' each pair will take a niffler, an' let it loose by this heap o' earth, where I've buried some coins. The pair who gets the most coins will win a prize."

The class crowded around the crate, picking out nifflers. By the time Lily and Mia reached the crate, there was only one niffler left, who appeared to be the runt of the litter, and was sniffing the air very half-heartedly.

"Hagrid!" Lily called. "Can we have that one?" she pointed to the first niffler Hagrid had taken out of the crate, which he was still holding.

"O' course," Hagrid smiled, handing the niffler over.

Kieran and Alexander walked up to the crate and peered inside. "He's tiny!" Kieran protested.

"So!?" Alexander said, reaching into the crate and letting the niffler sniff his hand before picking him up. "Good things come in small packages." Everyone in the vicinity laughed. Alexander was the shortest person in their year, a fact of which he was very proud.

Lily and Mia took their niffler over to the edge of the patch of earth, and released it on command. Soon, the niffler's were diving in and out of the soil, bringing mouthfuls of coins to their owners.

When all the coins had been found, everyone counted up their treasure. Alexander and Kieran's niffler had found the most, despite being the runt of the litter, and Hagrid rewarded them with a box of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans each.

"Now, then, Dove," Hagrid said. "Wha' quality would yeh like the creature we study nex' lesson to have?"

Dove thought for a minute. "Oooh!" she said. "I know, I'd like them to be pretty."

Lily rolled her eyes. "Trust her to choose 'pretty' over exciting, or scary, or dangerous."

"Al'righ'," Hagrid agreed. "I'll fine somethin' pretty for nex' lesson. Now then, homework – I'd like four inches on why niffler's are useful, an' another two on whether or not you'd like one as a pet, and why."

"I'm taking Muggle Studies and Care of Magical Creatures," Louis declared as they walked up to the castle for dinner.

Mia laughed. "You haven't even tried Social Studies, Arithmancy or Ancient Runes yet," she said.

The four of them parted in the doorway to the Great Hall to go to their respective house tables. After dinner, most of the gang gathered in the Inter-House Common Room, and Mia proceeded to tell Hugo's fortune.

"Right, first you must promise to do exactly as I tell you," Mia told him solemnly. "Or else the... vibes or something won't work."

"I promise," Hugo said, equally grave.

"Okay, sit down on the floor," Mia commanded, and Hugo sat obediently. "Now take the cards, and lay them in a perfect circle around you."

Hugo did as he was told, with the rest of the gang looking on. He solemnly laid the cards in a perfect circle around him, painstakingly making sure they were straight and evenly spaced. Mia watched him, trying hard not to giggle. When he'd finished, Hugo looked up at her expectantly. Gravely, Mia handed him a second pack of cards.

"Now, lay this pack, face down, around the outside of your first circle," Mia told him.

Hugo set to work, painstakingly placing the cards in a circle. When he was halfway round, the cards decided to explode, and Hugo's eyebrows got singed. Everyone else started laughing, despite Hugo's protests that it wasn't funny. Mia, now finding it near on impossible not to laugh, told him to get them back in a circle, and Hugo did so, eventually finishing, and looking up at Mia.

"There's one missing," he said.

Mia placed the last card, which she'd kept in her pocket instead of giving it to Hugo, face up in the gap in Hugo's circle. It was the Ace of Diamonds. Trying hard not to giggle, Mia sat down opposite Hugo, outside of his circles, and closed her eyes, letting the silence draw out as long as she dared.

Suddenly, Mia snapped her eyes open, which made Lily and Zoe start to laugh, and it was only with immense effort that Mia kept her poker face.

"I am ready," she announced gravely. "Your past is that you laid out all these cards. Your present is that you're listening to me. And your future... is that you're going to pick up all the cards and put them away!"  
The whole gang roared with laughter, and Hugo looked outraged.

"I thought you were really going to tell my fortune!" he said indignantly.

Having kept a straight face for so long, Mia was now laughing uncontrollably. It was left to Lily to giggle,

"That old bat Trelawney was right about one thing – Muggle fortune telling is all tricks and slights of hand."

When the laughter had died down, Hugo stood up and glared at Mia.

"Well, you got one thing wrong," he said. "I'm not going to pick up the cards – you can."

"Yes you are," Mia grinned. "You promised you'd do everything I said."

"Damn!" Hugo said. "I suppose I did..."

"It's your own fault for being so gullible," Louis laughed, as Hugo crouched down and started picking up the cards.


	7. Chapter Seven: Keeper Tryouts

Chapter Seven

Keeper Tryouts

The first Saturday of term dawned foggy, but by the time Mia had finished her breakfast and was walking out of the castle with Lily, Hugo and Louis, the fog had cleared, and the sky was clear and bright. Mia carried her broom down to the Quidditch pitch, because today was the day of the Keeper tryouts.

The Gryffindor Quidditch team was made up of three Chasers (James, Fred and Danielle Wood, who was also the team captain), two Beaters (Fred's sister Roxanne, and Mary Cattermole, whose brother was a second year, but in Ravenclaw), a Seeker (Danielle's younger brother Samuel) and a Keeper. Last year, the Keeper had been Will Darrow, who was also Head Boy, but he'd since left and was now playing as reserve Keeper for the Wimborne Wasps. Will had spent the previous year training Mia, and she was determined to make the team and do him proud.

When they reached the pitch, the rest of the team were already assembled. Mia knew that Danielle was planning on having the Chasers shoot penalties at the prospective Keepers, and that she might also want to try them out in a full game situation.

"Nervous?" James asked Mia as she, along with Lily, Hugo and Louis, walked up to him.

Mia nodded, and James grinned, slapping her on the back.

"You've got nothing to worry about," James told her. "Look at the rest of the idiots who are trying out." He nodded over to where a group of students stood. Mia only recognised third year Kyle Caplan, who'd tried out as Keeper last year, and eventually played as Chaser in a disastrous match against Ravenclaw, when James and Fred had got detention for the day of the match, and the replacement Chasers – Caplan being one of them – had been abysmal.

"They're all older than me!" Mia said. The other three prospective Chasers had to be at least fifth years.

"Doesn't mean they're better than you," James reminded her. "None of them were better than Darrow, and you're easily as good as him."

"Hello, everyone," Danielle's voice boomed out across the pitch – she had evidently used sonorous to make her voice louder. "Anyone who isn't part of the team or trying out for Keeper, could you please leave the pitch," she said. "If you want to watch, you can sit in the stands, but you'll be in the way if you stay where you are."

"Good luck!" Lily squealed, hugging Mia before going off to sit in the stands with Hugo and Louis.

Danielle announced that each prospective Keeper would take six penalties – two from each Chaser. Whoever saved the most would become Keeper.

Kyle Caplan was up first. As he took his penalties, Mia watched. She wasn't particularly watching Caplan, but the Chasers, especially Danielle. Will had told her that keeping was at least 50% knowing your opponent, and although she'd been playing with and against James and Fred all summer, she'd only played against Danielle once, at the start of the summer term last year. So as Caplan saved three goals, and the next prospective Keeper, a sixth year girl, saved four, Mia watched Danielle, trying to figure out how she played.

The next Keeper, a fifth year boy, saved five goals, all but a spectacular shot from James, which Mia heard Danielle call 'inspired' as the three Chasers landed, waiting for the next Keeper to take their place.

The fifth year girl saved one, two three, four goals. Then she missed one of Danielle's, which made her nervous, and she missed the last, and in Mia's opinion easy, shot from James.

Finally, it was Mia's turn. She was the last keeper to fly, and therefore knew what she had to do. She had to save all six penalties, otherwise she would tie with Josh, the 5th year boy. Gritting her teeth, she kicked off hard from the ground and headed for the goal hoops.

James was the first Chaser to fly towards her. Mia tried her best to watch his body language, his eyes and the Quaffle all at once. She knew Will had said that if James had time, he liked to double bluff, but knew from experience that wasn't always the case.

Sure enough, James flew straight at Mia, and, without any pretence, aimed for the left hand hoop. Mia flew left and punched the Quaffle out of the way – she wasn't quite quick enough to catch it. Down in the stands, she could hear Lily, Hugo and Louis cheering, which gave her confidence.

She saved the next two goals without much trouble, even Danielle's, which took her by surprise, because Danielle decided to shoot from much further away from the goal hoops than normal.

James came back for the fourth penalty, and Mia could tell it wasn't going to be such an easy save this time. Sure enough, James flew slowly towards her, first feinting one way, then the other, trying to get her to fly one way, so he could shoot the other. Mia held her ground, watching James' eyes.

When James was nearly close enough that Mia could just reach out and take the Quaffle from him, Mia saw his eyes flick left, as if checking that hoop was clear. It wasn't much – Mia could've blinked and missed it – but it was enough to make Mia think he was going to aim for the left hand hoop.

Mia flew left, and so did James, Mia caught the Quaffle and held it tightly to her chest. Only two more, and then she was in!

Fred was next, and, as he felt towards her, Mia could already tell what he was doing. James and Fred had spent all summer perfecting this particular move, where one Chaser would take up a position beside, but so far back they were almost behind, one of the outside goal hoops, and then the other Chaser would distract the Keeper by flying towards the other side goal hoop with the Quaffle, then pass it to the first Chaser, who would put it through the hoop before the Keeper had a chance to see what'd happened. Fred had spent several weeks insisting one person could execute the move on their own, although no one agreed with him.

So, when Mia saw Fred flying towards her, well out wide, she was ready. She began to drift over to that side, and so by the time Fred reached the goal hoop, there was no way he could get the Quaffle past her. He made a valiant attempt, trying to throw the Quaffle round her and through the centre hoop, but to no avail. As Mia passed the Quaffle back to Fred with a 'I told you you can't do that with only one person', she realised that she only had to block this last goal, from Danielle, and then she was Gryffindor Keeper.

Danielle flew towards her, Quaffle tucked under one arm. She was flying at the left goal hoop, but her eyes kept flicking to the right, so deliberately that Mia sensed a double bluff. But then she started doubting herself – what if Danielle wanted her to think she was double bluffing but she wasn't – a triple bluff.

Mia shook herself. Will had always told her to trust her instinct, because it was usually right, and if it wasn't then at least she couldn't blame herself for not listening to her instinct. So Mia ignored the bluffing and concentrated on the left hand hoop. Sure enough, Danielle shot left, and Mia dived left. She caught the Quaffle, and all but fell off her broom doing it. If it hadn't been for Danielle grabbing the back of her robes, she probably would have lost her balance and plummeted fifty feet to the ground below.

But she'd done it – she'd blocked all six goals, and now she was the Gryffindor Keeper! Mia could hear Lily, Hugo and Louis cheering her name as she landed on the pitch beside Danielle, and Danielle announced that Mia was the new Gryffindor keeper.

Josh, the 5th year boy who'd blocked five goals came up to shake Mia's hand. "Well done," he said. "The better Keeper won – you did good."

"You did good too," Mia said. "If it hadn't been for that shot of James'..."

"I know," Josh sighed. "'Inspired' James Potter, Quidditch hero, master business man, firstborn son of the famous Harry Potter..."

Mia's friends descended on her, just as Danielle came over to talk to Josh.

"Mia, Mia, Mia!" Lily continued the chant as she, Hugo and Louis attempted to pick her up.

"Leave off," Mia said, grinning all the same. She'd made it – she was on the Gryffindor Quidditch team.

After lunch, the gang congregated in the house common room to do homework.

"I can't believe we've got so much homework in only the first week," Hugo said, flicking through his copy of _The Standard Book Of Spells, Grade Two_. "Which pages did Flictwick say to read, someone?" he asked.

Half a dozen voices called out answers, some of them contradictory.

"It's because you've second years now," Mac grinned, hunched over a constellation diagram for Astronomy. "It's a step up from first year, you know... as is second to third..." he sighed and reached for a book to look something up.

"What are you doing first?" Lily asked Mia, just finishing making a list of all the homework she had to do.

"I'm writing to Will at the moment," Mia said, glancing up from her roll of parchment. "But then I think I'll do the thing on nifflers for Hagrid. It shouldn't take too long."

Mia told Will all about the Keeper tryouts. She described every save in detail, because she knew he'd be interested. In her excitement, she even remembered to ask Will how he was doing – playing for the Wimbourne Wasps reserves. Then she set the letter aside to send first thing in the morning – she couldn't be bothered to walk all the way up to the Owlery now – and got started on her homework.

It was only when she was lying in bed that night, in the few moments between wakefulness and sleep, that Mia remembered what Josh had said about James...

Sorry it's taken so long to update - between uni for me and NaNoWriMo for my wonderful Beta Triniroo, this chapter's been a long time coming. Enjoy!


	8. Chapter Eight: Quidditch Practice

Chapter Eight

Quidditch Practice

The Gryffindor Quidditch team usually held their practices on Thursday evening, so after dinner, Mia walked down to the pitch with James and Fred, who'd sat opposite her at dinner.

"So, ready to be put through your paces?" James grinned. "Danielle's a real slave driver."

"I have been at pretty much every practice for the last year," Mia reminded him.

"Well, at least you're prepared," Fred said. "Straight off to bed for the team baby when practice finishes."

"I wish," Mia sighed. "I've got Astronomy at midnight."

"Ah, Astronomy," James said knowingly. "Now that's one thing I don't miss..."

"James," Mia said, "do you know Josh Young?"

"Josh... Young..." James said. "I don't think so..."

"He tried out for Keeper before me – he's fifth year," Mia said.

"Oh, him," James nodded. "Yeah, but I only really know him by sight... why?"

"He seems to have some kind of vendetta against you," Mia said, and then proceeded to tell him what Josh had said after the Keeper tryouts.

But James only laughed. "I guess there are quite a few people who feel like that about me," he said. "I wasn't exactly the nicest of people in my first couple of years here. Not that I'm by any means a saint now-"

"Far from it," Fred said with a grin. James thumped him.

"Seriously, though, Mia – I wouldn't worry about it," James said as they reached the Quidditch pitch and headed into the changing rooms.

Danielle was already there, along with the two Beaters – Roxanne and Mary. She found Mia some robes which were small enough for her whilst the boys got changed into theirs.

"Hey, there are more girls on the team than boys now," Roxanne said, as Samuel Wood, the team's Seeker, walked into the changing room just as Mia was pulling on the robes Danielle had found her.

"Where have you been?" Danielle demanded of her brother.

"Dinner," Samuel said. "I had Divination last, so I had to come all the way down from there, and then eat-"

"I don't know why you take Divination, Sam," Roxanne said. "It really is a load of old rubbish."

"Yeah, but you can get good marks if you predict your own death often enough," Fred grinned.

"Right, enough about Divination," Danielle said. "Sam, hurry up and get changed – we're ready to start."

"I'm going as fast as I can," Samuel said, or at least that was what Mia thought he'd said – it was hard to tell since he had his robes over his head at the time.

"Right," Danielle said. "Our first match is against Slytherin, in just over three weeks, so we haven't got much time to prepare. I want to play in a game set-up for a bit, and then have a look at what needs working on."

For almost two hours, Danielle put the team through their paces. Mia found that saving penalties was one thing, but saving goals when Danielle, James and Fred were all flying towards her at once was quite another. Finally, as large drops of rain started to fall, threatening to soak them all in a matter of minutes, Danielle called the practice to an end.

By the time Mia reached the oak front doors of the castle, the rain had turned torrential, and she was soaked through. She dripped her way up to Gryffindor tower, just behind James and Fred. The common room was fairly full when they clambered through the portrait hole, and Mia heard someone say,

"Aww, look at the little Quidditch heroes. I didn't realise Quidditch practice involved dunking yourself in bucket loads of water."

She looked over to where the voice came from, and saw Josh Young, surrounded by a small group of friends, who were all laughing. Mia nudged James, and he nodded to show her he'd heard, before he and Fred headed up to their dormitory to get changed. Mia followed suit, and then went to join Lily and Hugo, who were sat in a corner, both halfway through a Potions essay.

"How was Quidditch practice?" Hugo asked.

"Wet?" Lily suggested.

"No – it only started raining as we were finished up," Mia said. "Yeah, it was good – Danielle really put us through our paces for the Slytherin match."

Lily checked her watch. "Still three hours to go til Astronomy," she sighed. "Lots of time to catch up with homework, I guess."

"If we can stay awake that long," Mia yawned, opening her copy of One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi as she tried to locate a quill.

It was almost half past one before the second years got to bed. Mia had meant to tell Lily about what Josh had said about James, but she fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. The next morning the second years had a free period first thing, so they all had a bit of a lie in, and only headed down to breakfast on Lily's insistence, because it was James' birthday and she wanted to see him.

When Lily, Hugo and Mia reached the Great Hall, James was sat with his girlfriend, Chlo, and his two best friends, Fred and Chris.

"Happy birthday!" Lily said, sitting down opposite her brother and handing him a present.

"Thanks, Lil," he said with a smile.

"I made it myself," Lily said proudly.

"Wrap it yourself too, did you?" Fred grinned, looking down at the oddly shaped package, bound with copious amounts of Spellotape.

Lily scowled at him as Mia and Hugo laughed. James quickly opened the present to deflect the argument. Lily had bought him a big photo frame, in which she'd made a collage of photos of James, and Albus and herself.

"Thanks, Lily – I love it." James grinned, hugging her awkwardly across the table.

"So, seventeen," Lily said, helping herself to toast from James' plate, because it was closer than the serving platter, several places along. "You're officially a grown-up now."

"Uh-huh," James nodded, reaching for a sausage from Chlo's plate.

"Oi!" Chlo said indignantly.

"Lily stole my breakfast, now I'm stealing yours," James shrugged. "But yeah, just you wait until Christmas, Lil; I'll be doing magic all over the place. Anyways, I better get to Charms. Coming, Chlo?"

"Sure," Chlo said, getting up.

Fred and Chris stood up too. "See you, suckers," Fred said.

"You're the sucker, actually," Hugo said. "You're off to class, whilst we can have a leisurely breakfast, since we have a free period."

Fred poked his tongue out at his cousin and walked away. Lily, Mia and Hugo took their time with their breakfast, and then headed up to Charms.

"Yay, Ilonka and Luci," Lily said unenthusiastically as the three of them climbed the marble staircase.

"Luci's not that bad," Mia said, for what already felt like the umpteenth time, even though it was only the second week of term.

"Yes she is," Lily insisted. "She's grumpy, and... well yeah, grumpy. And every time you try and be friendly she just snaps at you."

"I think she's just shy," Mia said.

Lily snorted, but they both chose to ignore her.

When they reached the Charms classroom, the class was already going inside. As she followed Lily and Hugo to their usual seats, Mia looked around for Luci, and spotted her at the back, sitting next to Ilonka. She got up when she saw Mia, and walked over to her.

"I am going to sit with Ilonka today," Luci informed Mia. "If that is okay?"

"Um... yeah, sure," Mia said, but Luci was already walking away.

"Good riddance," Lily muttered as she and Mia sat down.

Mia wasn't so sure. She glanced back at where Luci and Ilonka were sitting. Ilonka was talking animatedly, Luci putting in the occasional word. Mia wondered what Ilonka could be saying to hold Luci's attention for so long. Nothing good, she suspected. Probably something to do with how much she hated Lily.

"Why do you keep looking at her?" Lily demanded. "She fits right in with Ilonka's sheep."

Mia wasn't so sure, but she knew there was no point in trying to explain that to Lily, so she just bent down to fetch her homework from her bag.

That evening, Lily, Mia, Hugo and Louis sat with James, Fred and Chris in the Inter-House Common Room. The three sixth year boys were all supposed to be writing Potions essays, but Mia could see none of them had written more than a paragraph – they were too busy cracking jokes and bouncing ideas backwards and forwards for Weasley's Wizard Wheezes products.

"Hey, what's that?" Lily asked. Mia looked up to see a pale pink paper aeroplane flying towards James. Lily snatched it out of the air, but James took it from her before she could get a decent look at it.

"It's from Chlo," Fred grinned, peering over James' shoulder as he unfolded the aeroplane to reveal writing on the inside.

James held the unfolded aeroplane to his chest so his cousin couldn't read it. "Yeah, and it's private."

Chris wolf-whistled, and Fred said, "Oooh, private."

"But what is it?" Lily demanded.

"A love letter, duh," Fred said.

"Don't tell me you guys don't know about MIs?" Chris said.

"Of course they don't," Fred said condescendingly. "They're only ickle firsties."

"Second years," Louis put in indignantly.

"Whatever," Fred said.

"So what are these MIs?" Lily demanded.

"Message Instante, or something," Fred said. "They're French. The guys brought them back from the Triwizard last year."

"Why is it 'Message Instant' and not 'Instant Message'?" Hugo asked. "It doesn't make any sense..."

"Because the French are backward," Fred grinned.

"He means they structure their sentences differently," James explained. "Noun then adjective, not adjective-noun."

"But what are they?" Lily persisted.

James took a blue pad of paper out of his bag. Mia thought that it somewhat resembled a pad of sticky notes, only about four times the size. She saw that there were two small boxes at the top, one entitled 'from', and the other 'to'. James wrote his and Chlo's names in the boxes, and then scrawled a hasty message.

"So, I write who it's to, and my message, and then fold it up..." he tore the square out of the pad and folded it into a paper aeroplane. "Then I throw it..." He threw it, just like you would a muggle paper aeroplane, but unlike a Muggle paper aeroplane, it didn't plummet after a few feet, but continued flying, across the house common room and out of the open door. "And it'll get to Chlo," James finished.

[A/N: This is the Inter-House Common Room, which everyone can use, so the door is password protected, and is often open due to people going in and out all the time. But I've just noticed that I forgot to correct "house common room" to "Inter-House Common Room" a few paragraphs ago, so I've resolved that now.]

"It's like texting," Mia said.

"It's really taking off higher up the school," James said, grinning at his unintentional pun.

"How do I get some?" Lily demanded.

James fished a second pad out of his bag, this one canary yellow, and handed it to Lily. Share them out amongst the gang," he said. "If we can spread them throughout Hogwarts, I'll see if I can persuade Uncle George to contact the French company who makes them about making Wheezes the UK supplier."


	9. Chapter Nine: MIs

Chapter Nine

MIs

Over the next few weeks, MIs became increasingly popular in Hogwarts. Soon, you couldn't walk down the corridors without a swarm of brightly coloured paper aeroplanes flying overhead. At breakfast, they zig-zagged in and out of the post owls, and lessons were regularly disrupted by MIs flying in and out of the room.

The first Quidditch match of the season, Gryffindor vs Slytherin, was also fast approaching. In the practice, ten days before the match, Danielle managed to reduce Mary Cattermole to tears, and the training session was called to a halt by mutual consensus when Samuel and Fred started hexing each other.

"Well," Danielle said, as they all changed out of their robes in the changing rooms, "that was..."

"Abysmal," James supplied.

Danielle sighed. "I guess I'm just getting a bit worked up about the Slytherin match," she said. "I'm sorry I shouted at you, Mary."

"You don't need Sonorous when you get worked up like that, Dan," Samuel said with a grin.

"We'll need at least one extra practice next week," Danielle said. "But I don't know when yet since I'll have to book the pitch... so I guess I'll come and find you all sometime..."

"Or you could just send us MIs," Fred suggested.

"I'm out," Danielle shrugged. "I've ordered some more, but they take ages to come from France."

James reached into his bag, tore off six MIs from his own pad, and handed them to Danielle.

"Cheers," Danielle said. "Okay, so I'll MI you all."

The next morning at breakfast, just as people were about to leave for their first lesson, Professor McGonnagal stood up to speak.

"I just wanted to talk to you all about these 'MIs' which I have seen around the castle recently," she said. "Now, I understand that they are a useful way to communicate, but their presence is also very disruptive during lessons-"

"She better not be about to ban them," James muttered. "I've just about got Uncle George convinced they're worth the investment."

"So," Professor McGonnagal continued, "from now on, MIs will be banned from classrooms. Teachers will be putting spells on their classroom doors this morning, causing any MIs whose recipient is in class to wait outside the door until they leave."

James breathed a sigh of relief as Professor McGonnagal sat down again. "I guess it's fair enough," he said. "They do get kind of distracting flying around during the lessons."

A bright red MI flew down the table and hovered in front of James, nudging the side of his head. He took it, unfolded it, skimmed the short note, and then grinned.

"It's from McGonnagal," he said. "Inviting me to tea tonight."

"Why?" Chris asked.

"Because she's my godmother," James said.

"Oh yeah..." Chris said.

James looked up at the staff table, where Professor McGonnagal was sat in her seat in the centre, and Mia could have sworn she winked at James.

After breakfast, Lily, Mia and Hugo headed up to Charms, where Luci was once again sat with Ilonka, the two of them giggling about something.

"What does she see in Ilonka?" Lily said grumpily, sitting down in her usual seat.

"What does anyone see in Ilonka?" Hugo responded, sitting down beside Lily as Mia settled herself on her other side.

"I ask myself that question daily," a voice said from behind them, to see Ruby McLaggan stood there.

"Hi Ruby," Mia said. "Wanna join us?"

"Please," Ruby said, sitting down in the spare seat beside Mia. "You should try sharing a dormitory with Ilonka and her sheep," she said.

Lily grinned. "Mac'll be glad his petname for them is doing the rounds."

Ruby looked round at Ilonka and co. "Suits them, doesn't it?" she said. "They follow her around like little sheep." She turned back to Mia. "So, your first Quidditch match next week," she said. "We're so going to flatten you."

"Are not."

"Are too."

"Good morning second years," squeaked tiny Professor Flitwick, climbing onto the stack of books which enabled him to see over his desk.

Over the next few days it became commonplace to see little flocks of MIs outside each classroom, waiting for their recipients to get out of lessons. On Monday, Mia came out of Ancient Runes to find a MI circling her head.

She pulled it out of the air, unfolded it and read,

'Mia, Quidditch practice tonight, 7pm, Danielle.'

"Good job you finished all your homework yesterday," Lily said, peering over her shoulder. "Although I wouldn't want to be flying in that."

Mia looked out of the window at the rain beating against the glass. She wasn't particularly looking forward to flying in that weather, but she knew there was a chance that it would still be like this on Saturday, so she needed experience of playing in the torrential rain.

The four of them headed down for dinner, Louis trying to explain to Hugo why he'd got confused in the translation they'd just done. At the Gryffindor table, Lily, Mia and Hugo joined Hugo's sister, Rose, and Lily's brother, Al. Rose was picking at her food and staring into space.

"What's up with you?" Hugo asked.

"She broke up with Scorp again," Al said boredly. "In Transfiguration. Loudly. Duncan gave them both detention."

"I didn't break up with him, he broke up with me," Rose said moodily, reaching across Al for another sausage even though she already had three on her plate.

"Same difference." Al shrugged. "It still means you'll both be grumpy for a couple of days until you make up."

"How many times have they broken up now, Al?" Lily asked.

"Fifty seven," Al said happily. "But this is only the third time this term."

"It's no laughing matter," Rose said irritably.

"It kinda is," Hugo reasoned.

A dark green MI flew into Rose's head, and Al pulled it out of the air.

"It's from Scorp," he confirmed. "Wanna read it?"

"No," Rose sighed. "I'm going to bed."

"But it's not even six o'clock," Lily protested.

"I'm really tired," Rose said, getting up and heading for the door.

Al sighed. "This whole Rose-Scorp thing is getting old pretty fast," he said.

"You need to get yourself a girlfriend," Lily told him. "Then you won't be stuck in the middle when they're arguing, or a third wheel when they're all lovey-dovey."

"Hmm..." was all that Al said.

"So, who do you like?" Mia grinned.

"No one," Al said.

"But you're ancient," Lily protested.

"I'm fourteen, Lily," Al said.

"Exactly," Lily said. "You're ancient. I'm going to find you a girlfriend."

"I do not want you to find me a girlfriend," Al said firmly, but Lily just giggled.

After dinner, Lily, Mia and Hugo headed up to the house common room, where Mac Walter was entertaining some of the other members of the gang with tales of his summer holiday in France. Mia only stayed for about half an hour, before heading down to Quidditch practice.

She was the first one there, apart from Danielle, and the two of them talked strategy whilst waiting for the others to arrive. Fred came first, followed by Roxanne and Mary, and then Samuel.

"Has anyone seen James?" Danielle asked once they were all ready and waiting. "Fred?"

Fred shrugged. "He disappeared straight after dinner."

"Well, we'll have to start without him," Danielle said decisively. "Now, I know it's not ideal conditions, but chances are it'll still be like this when we play Slytherin on Saturday. Let's go."

The six of them headed out to the pitch. The rain had eased up a bit, but it was still raining hard. Mia was soaked through by the time she reached the goal hoops, and visibility was poor. At least the Quaffle was red, Mia thought, as play started. But she soon realised that the Quaffle was the least of her worries. It was all she could do to stop being unseated by a Bludger. Since they were black they all but got lost in the rain, and the gathering dark didn't help matters either. In the end, Danielle called a halt after about an hour, when James still hadn't arrived.

"I wonder where he got to..." Fred mused as the team walked back to the castle en masse.

"It's not like James to miss practice," Roxanne agreed.

When the team reached the Gryffindor common room on the seventh floor, Samuel gave the password to the Fat Lady, and the six of them scrambled inside.

James and Chlo were sat in the armchair fairly near the portrait hole, limbs entangled and lips locked together. Danielle marched over to them.

"So, you thought you'd sit inside and snog your girlfriend rather than come to practice, did you?" she demanded angrily, in a voice which made half the common room crane their necks to see what was going on.

James and Chlo broke apart, and James looked up a Danielle, with the rest of the team ranged behind her, a puzzled look on his face.

"There wasn't practice tonight, was there?" he asked eventually.

"Oh no, the rest of us just thought we'd go out for a nice little stroll in the torrential rain," Danielle retorted, her voice oozing sarcasm.

"But..." James began.

"You know, James, I didn't think you were one to blow off practice, but I guess I was mistaken."

Chlo disentangled herself from James and stood up. "James can't have known it was practice tonight, Danielle, or you know he'd've been right out there with the rest of you."

"Yeah," James said. "No one told me there was practice tonight, or you know I'd've been there."

"Well, this is me telling you now," Danielle said. "There's a practice, usual time, on Thursday, and you'd better be there."

As Danielle stalked off, a voice piped up, "Looks like someone's in the dog house." Mia looked around to see Josh Young, surrounded by his usual group of friends. Mia wanted to march over at him and tell him to stop being so smug, but, considering he was a fifth year and she only a second, she decided it probably wasn't the best of ideas.

"She should've sent MIs," James said grumpily, tugging Chlo back down onto his lap. "I told her to – even gave her the flipping things."

"She did, mate," Fred laughed,

"Then how come I didn't get mine?" James demanded.

"Lost in the post?" Fred shrugged.


	10. Chapter Ten: Bludgers and Broomsticks

Chapter Ten

Bludgers and Broomsticks

Saturday, the morning of the match, dawned cool and drizzly, and Alexander Abercrombie, whose Muggle mother was a weather reporter, and was therefore seen to be an expert on the subject, predicted that it was only likely to get worse.

Mia hadn't thought she was going to be nervous, but when she woke up that morning, the butterflies were so bad that Lily had to practically drag her out of bed.

"Come on," she said. "You have to have breakfast, get some energy... or something."

Mia shook her head. "If I do, I'll only throw up... in mid-air..."

"Great," Lily said with a grin. "I've always wondered what vomit falling from fifty feet looks like," she said.

"Sickening," Alice put in from the other side of the room.

Lily rolled her eyes at the awful pun. "Seriously, Mia, you need some breakfast."

Grudgingly, Mia followed Lily down to breakfast. When they reached the Great Hall, Lily led Mia to the far end of the Gryffindor table where the rest of the team was already assembled. The two of them sat down opposite James and Fred.

"Alright?" James asked Mia.

Mia nodded, pouring herself a bowl of cereal, more to have something to do than because she actually wanted to eat.

"Nervous?" James asked, and Mia nodded again. James laughed. "That good, huh? I always think being a bit nervous before a game's a good thing."

"Not when it feels like I'm going to throw up if I open my mouth," Mia said through gritted teeth.

James just laughed again. "You'll get used to it," he told her, reaching for his fourth slice of toast.

Hugo and Louis joined them, Hugo decked in red and gold and Louis sporting a hat which was a roaring lion's head.

"Nice hat, cuz," Fred snicked. "Where did you get it?"

"Luna leant it to me," Louis grinned.

"Why didn't she give it to me?" Lily pouted. "I am her goddaughter."

"Because she likes me better," Louis grinned, poking his tongue out at Lily.

Their banter made Mia feel a bit better, momentarily taking her mind off the fact that in an hour's time she'd be out on the Quidditch pitch, in front of the entire school, trying not to let her team mates – and Will – down.

As the Great Hall filled up around them, several Slytherins made the detour over to the Gryffindor table to insult or jeer at the team. The team members who had more experience with this, particularly James, Fred and Danielle, just took it in their stride, and often insulted back. Mia just tried to ignore them and eat her cereal.

"Hey Potter, how much would you bet me that the Mudblood'll be the first to fall off her broom?"

Mia turned around to see a tall Slytherin girl who she didn't recognise stood behind her.

"How much do you bet me that I could hex you into the middle of next week if I could be bothered to get off my good-for-nothing-half-blood butt?" James retorted lazily.

The girl glared at him and then walked away as Fred and Samuel laughed.

"You're not technically a half-blood, though, are you?" Samuel mused.

James shrugged. "Maybe not. But I'm not a pure blood, and that's all that matters to people like _her_."

"Who was that, anyway?" Hugo asked.

"Ana Kallous," Fred practically spat. "Hey, hasn't she got a sister in your year?"

Mia nodded. "Ilonka."

"And isn't that her walking over right now?" James asked.

Mia turned around, along with Lily, Hugo and Louis, to see Ilonka and the three other Slytherin girls whom Mac called her sheep, walking towards the Gryffindor table.

"Hey, losers," Ilonka said.

Lily tried to get to up, but Mia and Hugo, sat on either side of her, grabbed her arms and held her down.

"Hey, pint-sized loser," Fred responded, grinning.

Ilonka ignored him. "Hey Brooke," she said, turning to the girl next to her. "Which one d'you think our guys will hit will hit with a Bludger first?"

"Puh-lease," James said. "Bole and Warrington are so abysmal it ought to be Slytheirn worrying about being hit by Bludgers from them."

Ilonka glared at him. "Well, you've got a Mudblood on your team, so-"

James gasped, faking shock. "Hey Fred, did you know we've got a Muggle born on the team? I wonder who it is... hey, is it you?" he asked seriously.

"No, she didn't say 'Muggle born', she said a very dirty word," Fred said, equally seriously. "D'you reckon we ought to wash her mouth out with soap, since her mummy obviously never taught her that swearing's very naughty."

"I think we should, Fred," James said. "Otherwise she might grow up not knowing right from wrong, and who knows where that might get her?"

The two of them got to their feet and Ilonka snorted, and turned on her heel and marched off, the other girls following her. James and Fred both laughed.

"And that's how you deal with idiots like her, Lil," James said. "Don't get angry – she feeds off it."

"Hmm..." was all that Lily said.

Fifteen minutes later, Danielle decided it was time for the team to be heading down to the pitch. As they stood up, there were cheers from the Gryffindor table and boos from the Slytherins. Once in the changing rooms, Danielle began her pep talk.

"Roxanne and Mary, make sure you work together and keep the Bludgers off Sam so he can concentrate on the Snitch, and off us chasers and Mia, so we can concentrate on the score. James and Fred, just behave, and don't show off. Mia, do your best, but don't be too hard on yourself if you let a couple of goals in, or you'll put yourself off. Sam, get the Snitch before Malfoy does. Alright, let's go."

Mia followed the rest of the team onto the pitch, where Mac Walter was giving his usual pre-match commentary.

"And, there haven't been many major changes to either team's line-up this year," he was saying. "Just one change a piece – Slytherin replace last year's captain, chaser Aiden Belby, with fifth year Luke Conlin, and Gryffindor replace keeper Will Darrow with second year Mia Dursley."

The teams stood in two lines, facing each other.

"Captains, shake hands," Madam Hooch said.

Danielle stepped forward, along with a tall Slytherin boy, whom Mia knew to be Buzz Derrick, a chaser. The two of them shook hands, and Mia could tell that they were both doing their best to crush each other's fingers.

"Mount your brooms."

Mia got ready for the whistle – this was it, her first match, and she was going to do Gryffindor proud.

Madam Hooch blew her whistle, and Mia kicked off hard from the ground, heading for the goal hoops, listening to Mac's commentary so she knew what was going on, but not concentrating on it too much.

"And it's Gryffindor's Wood with the Quaffle," Mac was saying into the magical megaphone. "She passes to Weasley, intercepted by Derrick, nice Bludger from Cattermole there, Derrick drops it, picked up by Potter, and it's Gryffindor's James Potter heading for goal!"

Through the rain, Mia could just about make out what was going on at the other end of the pitch. James was heading for goal, he passed to Danielle, who dodged a Slytherin player, and then passed to Fred, who scored.

Cheers erupted from the Gryffindor stands, but Mia didn't let herself get too distracted. The Slytherin keeper, Montague, had retrieved the Quaffle, and she now passed it to one of the Slytherin chasers, who flew up the pitch towards Mia.

"And it's Slytherin's Scarlett McLaggan in possession, she passes to Conlin, to Derrick, back to McLaggan, intercepted by Wood, who passes to Potter, back to Wood, to Weasley, nice Bludger from Warrington, Weasley drops the Quaffle and it's caught by Slytherin's newest team-member, Conlin. And he's heading for goal – could this be the first test of the match for new Gryffindor keeper Dursley?"

Mia steeled herself. This was it – time to show what she was made of. Unlike McLaggan and Derrick, the other Slytherin Chasers, Conlin was an unknown entity. In all the Quidditch games last year, she'd alternated watching the Keepers and the Chasers. She already had a fair idea of how McLaggan and Derrick played, and the rest of the team had filled her in on what they knew, but she knew nothing about how Conlin played.

He was flying towards her now, Quaffle under his arm. He dodged a Bludger from Roxanne, heading for the left hand hoop. Mia turned slightly to face him, making sure she was still covering all three hoops. She couldn't rule out Conlin passing to one of the other chasers who came up her other side; it was a manoeuvre James and Fred were fond of.

Conlin threw the Quaffle towards the left hand hoop, and Mia caught it. A roar swelled up from the crowd, and Mia thought she could just about make out Louis' lion hat through the din. She'd done it – she'd stopped a real goal in a real match. With a new sense of confidence, Mia passed the Quaffle back to Danielle, who was waiting for it, and watched her fly off down the pitch.

As the match lengthened, Mia began to enjoy herself, rather than feeling nervous, and with every save she made, she grew in confidence. It didn't even bother her too much when she let her first goal in – it was a spectacular one from Scarlett McLaggan, which Mac referred to as 'epic'. Thinking her friend needed to learn some new adjectives, Mia passed the Quaffle back to James, and watched him, Fred, and Danielle fly off up the pitch, passing the Quaffle between them, and score another goal, bringing the score to 40-10 in their favour.

Mia glanced up to where Samuel and the Slytherin seeker, Rose's on-and-off-again boyfriend, Scorpius Malfoy, were circling high above, looking for the snitch. With only 30 points in it, it was anyone's game; if either of the boys caught the snitch anytime soon then their team would win.

"And it's Slytherin Captian Derrick with the Quaffle, he passes to Conlin, back to Derrick, to McLaggan..."

The three Slytherin chasers were flying in formation toward Mia, passing the Quaffle back and forth between them so quickly that the Gryffindor players didn't have a chance at intercepting, although James and Fred had wormed their way into the formation, so that the players now stretched out in front of Mia in a Christmas-like red and green pattern.

Just as the Slytherin captain was about to shoot, a Bludger came out of nowhere, straight towards Mia. She dived to avoid it, but could hear from the roar of the crowd that Derrick had scored. Ravenclaw had used this exact technique against Will last year.

"Sorry, Mia!" Mary yelled, flying past her in pursuit of the Bludger.

"We were stopping the other Bludger braining Danielle," Roxanne added, also flying past.

As the match lengthened, Mia really got into her stride, helped by Roxanne and Mary keeping the Bludgers away from her. There was still no sign of the Snitch, although there was one incident where Samuel and Scorpius both dived after a glint of gold which turned out to be Madam Hooch's watch.

"And it's Gryffindor's Fred Weasley with the Quaffle, he passes to Potter, to Wood, back to Potter, and it's James Potter headed for goal!" Mac said.

Mia watched James streaking up the pitch, dodging Bludgers and players alike – he'd obviously inherited his namesake's Quidditch ability. "And the 'unstoppable Potter' really is tearing up this pitch – can he extend Gryffindor's lead?"

Mia expected he could, and sure enough, he dodged round keeper Montague, and put the Quaffle through the centre hoop.

"GRYFFINDOR SCORE!" Mac yelled into the magical megaphone. "That's Gryffindor's James Potter, extending his team's lead and bringing the score to 110-50. And now it's Slytherin in possession – Scarlett McLaggan to be precise... but wait – Malfoy's diving; has the Slytherin seeker seen the Snitch?"

Everyone, including the other players, looked up to see Scorpius diving. Scarlett McLaggan, the Slytherin chaser, had stopped in mid-air, still holding the Quaffle, but suddenly not at all interested in it. Samuel was hot on Scorpius' tail, but Mia knew from experience that Scorpius could usually out-fly the older boy. Mia still couldn't see the Snitch itself, but could tell roughly where it was by the way the boys were flying, and could also tell when it moved in Samuel's favour.

Something hard stuck Mia in the side, and she gasped for breath. It was a Bludger – she could see it careering happily off down the pitch.

"WOOD'S CAUGHT THE SNITCH!" Mia heard Mac yell, and looked down to see Samuel stood in the middle of the pitch, triumphantly holding the snitch aloft. "GYFFINDOR WINS WITH 260 POINTS TO 50!"

"Mia, are you alright?" James called, flying away from the celebration to towards the goal hoops.

Mia was suddenly aware how much her side hurt where the Bludger had hit her. She was finding it hard to breathe.

"What happened?" James asked over the din, pulling up in mid-air beside her. "Did that Bludger hit you?"

Mia nodded. "I think it might have broken some ribs."

"Can you fly?" James asked.

Mia shook her head, breathing through the pain. It was all she could do to stay on her broom, let alone fly it.

"Alright, climb on the back of my broom and I'll get you down," James said.

Scorpius had seen what was going on, and had come up to help. Together, he and James manoeuvred Mia onto the back of James' broom. They'd almost reached the ground when Mia passed out.


	11. Chapter Eleven: Mia's Birthday

Chapter Eleven

Mia's Birthday

Mia came round in the hospital wing. She could hear Louis' hat roaring before she opened her eyes. Sure enough, her bed was surrounded by her friends and teammates.

"Yay! You're back with us!" she heard Lily say, and saw her push her way toward the front to stand beside the bed.

"Madam Pomfrey, she's awake!" called a voice, which Mia recognised as Mac's, although she couldn't see him.

"What happened?" Mia asked, poking her ribs gingerly – they didn't hurt.

"Two broken ribs," Madam Pomfrey said briskly, bustling over to Mia's bed. "Didn't take long to fix them – does anything hurt?"

Mia shook her head.

"You were epic, Mia!" Mac's voice called from the crowd – the entirety of the Gryffindor Quidditch team was there, plus most of the gang, and Al, Rose and Scorp. Mia grinned – Mac really did need to learn some new adjectives.

"Right, out, all of you," Madam Pomfrey said. "Mia needs some breathing space."

People started to move off, grumbling.

"I won't be keeping her long," Madam Pomfrey said. "Just another half hour or so."

"We'll wait for you in the common room," Danielle said. "I think James and Fred are going to get food from the house elves."

"Do we all have to go?" Lily asked hopefully.

"Yes, all of you," Madam Pomfrey said, shooing her out too, as well as Hugo and Louis, who'd also been inclined to linger. "You'd think this was a common room rather than a hospital wing, the amount of people that were in here. Off you go."

Madam Pomfrey was true to her word, and forty-five minutes later, Mia was heading up to Gryffindor tower. The party was already in full swing when she arrived, and it was with great difficulty that Mia fought her way through to the middle of the room where the Gryffindor Quidditch team was.

James was in the middle of proposing a series of toasts – to Samuel, to the Golden Snitch, to Madam Hooch, to Bludgers... He spotted Mia and dragged her into the middle of the circle, and, raising his goblet of pumpkin juice aloft, cried, "To Mia Dursley, and her 'epic' debut as Gryffindor Keeper!"

Mia grinned sheepishly as everyone echoed 'to Mia!' and drained their goblets.

"You've forgotten yourself, Potter," said a scathing voice. Mia looked over to see Josh Young barging his way into the circle. He snatched James' goblet out of his hand, and held it aloft mockingly. "To James 'unstoppable' Potter, whom we all must fall down and worship if he as much as sneezes."

"Look, mate, what's your problem?" James demanded.

"You are," Josh spat. "And I'm not your mate."

He pushed his way back out of the circle.

"What's up with him?" Roxanne said.

"He's just sore he didn't make Keeper," Fred said. "James was the only one who got a goal past him."

James shook his head. "I don't think it's just that..." he mused. "Anyway, let's not let him spoil our party... I propose a toast to... to whoever invented Quidditch!"

"To whoever invented Quidditch!"

When Mia went to help herself to some of the food James, Fred and Chris has brought up from the kitchens, she spotted Luci sat by herself over in a corner. Remembering Professor Longbottom had asked her to look after Luci, Mia went over to see if she wanted to join them.

"No thank you – I am busy," Luci replied curtly.

"You're always 'busy'," Lily said – she'd followed Mia over. "You can't have that much homework to do."

"I am not doing homework," Luci said. "I am just reading."

"You're always 'just reading'," Lily said. "You know, you might actually make some friends if you joined in with people, instead of being by yourself all the time... did you even come to the match?"

Luci shook her head. "No. Quidditch does not interest me."

"But you should have come just to support Gryffindor," Lily said hotly. "And what's not to like about Quidditch?"

"Lily-" Mia began, laying a warning hand on her friend's arm, but Lily shook it off, as Luci responded,

"I do not care about your houses, and sport has never interested me."

"Well you should care!" Lily said. "You're in Gryffindor, so you should care about it."

"I am only in Gryffindor as long as I am here," Luci told her. "And that is not long."

"Once you're a Gryffindor, you're a Gryffindor for life," Lily told her. "But I wish you weren't. You should've been in Slytherin with Ilonka and her 'sheep' – you fit right in!"

She stormed off, and Mia hesitated before following – she felt she should say something to Luci, but wasn't sure what. She guessed that she should be trying harder to be friends with Luci, but it wasn't easy being friends with someone who insisted on keeping herself to herself.

Mia's thirteenth birthday was on the 13th of October, a Monday. Louis found it funny that she was going to be thirteen on the 13th, but Mia didn't see why – he'd turned one on the 1st of November, and Lily had turned six on the 6th of July.

The first lesson on Monday morning was double Transfiguration with Professor Duncan. Mia and her friends made sure they got there early enough to get seats at the back. They still wouldn't be able to get away with doing anything other than the work they were supposed to be doing, but at least they were less likely to be picked on.

"It's rotten luck having Duncan, and then History of Magic, on your birthday," Lily said, as they settled down at the back of the Transfiguration classroom and got their books out.

Mia shrugged. "It could be worse – Potions, Modern History, Charms and Muggle Studies later."  
Luci came into the classroom and sat down the spare seat beside Mia without a word.

"Yeah, but it's still unlucky to have Duncan on your birthday," Lily persisted.

"Not really," Hugo said. "We have Transfiguration four days a week – unless your birthday's in the holidays, you're more likely to have Transfiguration than not."

"Happy Birthday, Mia," Luci said.

"Thanks," Mia smiled, turning to face her. "When's your birthday?"

"Christmas Eve," Luci told her.

"I think that'd be weird, having my birthday so close to Christmas," Mia said.

Luci shrugged. "My birthday has always been then, so..."

"I guess you're used to it," Mia smiled. "It would probably feel weird if your birthday wasn't that close to Christmas."

The first three lessons that morning were predictably boring, and Mia found herself looking forward to Potions, which was the lesson before lunch. Unlike Professors Duncan and Binns, Professor Cooke always seemed to make an effort to make her lessons interesting, and, as a consequence, Mia felt like she was actually making progress in Potions, unlike Transfiguration and History of Magic, both of which she struggled in.

"Hi Cassie," Mia said, sitting down next to her friend in Potions.

"Hi," Cassie responded, not looking up from the essay they'd had to write for homework. Mia noticed that Cassie's essay wasn't written in the neat script she'd come to associate with Cassie, but in a larger, untidier hand.

"Did you write that yourself?" Mia asked. Cassie had only learnt to read last Easter, and usually dictated answers to a quill which wrote for her, but it looked like she'd written this one in her own hand.

"Yeah," Cassie said, glancing up from her roll of parchment. "Oh... happy birthday, Mia."

"Thanks," Mia smiled. "Hey, are you alright?"

"I'm fine," Cassie said, looking back down at her essay.

"Really?" Mia asked.

"Really," Cassie said, but Mia wasn't so sure.

Lily came in and sat opposite Mia, closely followed by Zoe and then Luci.

"What's up with Cassie?" Lily asked Zoe in a too-loud whisper.

Zoe shrugged. "She's been like this all morning."

Professor Cooke came in at that point and started the lesson, so there was no more opportunity to discuss Cassie. Throughout the forty-five minute period, she worked meticulously, but silently, and it took a lot of effort to get her attention. Mia thought it was like she was in a world of her own.

That evening, James, Fred and Chris organised a birthday party for Mia in the Inter-House Common Room, getting food from the house elves. Zoe came without Cassie, telling Mia she'd gone to bed. Yes, Mia thought as she lay in bed that night, there was definitely something up with Cassie. And knowing Cassie, she wasn't likely to find out what it was anytime soon – it had taken Cassie eight months to pluck up the courage to tell them she couldn't read.


	12. Chapter Twelve: Post, Disarming and

Chapter Twelve

Post, Disarming, and Terrifying Creatures

The next few weeks after Mia's birthday seemed to fly past. The teachers were handing out more and more homework, reminding them that second year was a step up from first, and Mia had Quidditch practice at least once a week. Before she knew it, it was the last week in October, and all anyone could talk about was the Halloween feast, on Friday night.

"Still two days of lessons to go before the feast," Lily sighed at breakfast on Thursday morning.

"Honestly, Lily, anyone would think you didn't want to be here," Hugo said, or at least that was what Mia thought he was saying – in the last year she'd become somewhat of an expert at translating his grunts through mouthfuls of food.

"I do!" Lily protested. "It's just sometimes... when I see Duncan on my timetable..."

"You see Duncan on your timetable four days a week," Mia reminded her.

Albus came and sat down opposite them.

"Hi Al," Lily said. "Where's Rose?"

"Still snogging Scorp in the Entrance Hall," Al said, sounding mildly disgusted. "You'd think they hadn't seen each other for years the way they carry on sometimes."

"So, who do you like?" Lily asked – she'd been asking her brother that question every time she saw him recently.

"No one," Al replied, but Mia could see him turning slightly red. She giggled, and he rounded on her. "What?"

"You do like someone," Mia grinned. "You're blushing."

"Do not... am not..." Al said. "Hey look, there's the post."

Mia noted the deliberate change of subject, but let it slide, looking up as a hundred or so owls soared in through the high windows. Mia wasn't expecting any post – her parents didn't own an owl, and so only wrote to her when she sent her owl, Felix, home.

Something landed in the milk jug in the middle of the table, splashing not only Mia, but Al, Lily and Hugo too. Al reached into the jug and fished out a small, black, feathery owl which Mia recognised as belonging to Will Darrow, last year's Gryffindor Keeper and Head Boy. The letter tied to its leg was soaked in milk, but Al dried it with a charm, and then Mia opened it.

She was surprised to see the letter was fairly long, at least compared to Will's usual two-or-three sentence exchanges.

'Hi Mia, thanks for your letter and I'm sorry for not replying sooner. I've been really busy – I played for the Wasps in a real match last week, and the reserve team have had lots of matches against other reserve teams. Congratulations on winning the match – pass this on to the rest of the team for me? And tell Roxanne and Mary that they need to keep a better watch on the Bludgers – but I'm glad you're alright. Madam Pomfrey's good like that – no injury's serious for more than a few minutes when she around. Please do keep me informed about what's going on at Hogwarts – I miss the place. Will.'

"What's that?" Lily asked.

"Letter from Will," Mia told her, watching his owl try to steal some bacon from Hugo's plate. "Just saying well done for the first Quidditch match, and saying that he played a real game for the Wimbourne Wasps last week."

"Cool!" Lily said. "I wish I could've gone – I haven't seen a professional Quidditch match since before I started Hogwarts."

"But you used to?" Mia asked. "Before Hogwarts?"

"All the time," Lily nodded. "Mum used to chase for the Holyhead Harpies – she retired just before I was born – and now she's Quidditch correspondent for the Prophet, she can get tickets pretty much whenever she wants. Maybe I'll see if we can go to a game next summer, and take you too."

"We'd better get to Defence Against the Dark Arts," Hugo said, pushing Will's owl away from his plate. "Go on, get lost. Go and have a sleep in the Owlery or something before you go back to Will."

The owl hooted indignantly and took off, as Lily, Mia and Hugo got up from the table. When their parents were at school, over twenty years ago, the Defence Against the Dark Arts job had been jinxed by Voldermort so that no one could hold it for more than a year. After his death, the jinx had been lifted, and their current teacher, Professor Edwards, had held the post for over twenty years, after being the only one brave enough to prove the jinx had been lifted.

"Good morning, second years," he said, shutting the door once they had all arrived. "Alright, books away, wands out."

Everyone grinned – all the best lessons started out like this. Once they'd all put their books away, Professor Edwards moved the desk to the sides of the room with a flick of his wand, and told them all to get into pairs and stand facing their partners, several feet apart.

"Alright, from now until Christmas, we're going to be learning some simple defensive spells," Professor Edwards said. "Starting with disarming... so, who knows the incantation?"

A dozen hands waved in the air.

"Mr Weasley?"

"Expelliarmus," Hugo said.

"Exactly – five points for Gryffindor. Now then, without wands, let's practice the incantation: Expelliarmus."

"Expelliarmus," the class echoed.

"Good, good," Professor Edwards said. "Right, wands at the ready, and then on the count of three, I want you to try and disarm your partner... one...two... three!"

"Expelli-" Mia began, but Lily was quicker than her, and she found her wand flying out of her hand and across the room towards Lily.

"Alright, well done, collect your wands and try again," Professor Edwards said. As they practiced, he walked up and down the lines, offering corrections and advice. "A little more force, Miss Andrews; you're trying to disarm Miss Davies, not tickle her... Try and aim better, Mr Pryor; Miss Longbottom's not your partner, is she?... I hope that's only disarming that's going on down there, Mr Finnigan, Mr Abercrombie..."

Throughout the course of the lesson, Mia managed to disarm Lily several times, although Lily was obviously better at it than she was. Every one found it amusing to watch Alice and Frankie Longbottom, who only seemed capable of uttering the incantation simultaneously had having their wands fly out of their hands together in perfect mirror arcs. At the end of the lesson, Professor Edwards got them to put the tables back, and then set them questions on disarming and wandlore.

If there were some subjects, such as Defence Against the Dark Arts, which were almost universally liked, there were others which were almost universally disliked. Divination was one of these. Although some people, such as Liam Coote and Oscar Peeks, and Dove Ackerley and her friends, seemed genuinely interested in what Professor Trelawney had to say, the general consensus was that she was an old bat who talked a load of rubbish.

The second year Gryffindors and Ravenclaws had Divination every other Thursday afternoon. As they walked up to the very top of the castle, Lily was already in a bad mood – she'd had arguments with both Luci and Professor Duncan in Transfiguration, and narrowly avoided getting detention.

"I might just skive Divination and get started on those Defence questions," Lily sighed.

"I wouldn't do that, young miss," a portrait of an old wizard with a boil on his nose, said. "You'll get into trouble if you skip classes."

"Shut it," Lily scowled at the portrait. "You can't tell me what to do."

"That's no way to speak to your elders, young lady!" the wizard said, running into a neighbouring painting to keep up with them, and knocking over two unicorns as he did so.

They all ignored him. "Divination'll be a laugh," Hugo told Lily. "It's fun to see how many ways we can predict our own deaths."

"Hmm," Lily said.

"Divination is a noble subject," began the wizard-with-a-boil, who was still pursuing them up the corridor, followed by shouts of 'watch where you're going!' from the occupants of the other paintings he was running through.

No one paid him any attention as they climbed the last flight of stairs to the landing below Professor Trelawney's classroom, joining the rest of the class in waiting for the ladder to be let down from the trap door.

As they headed down to Hagrid's hut, almost an hour later, Mia had to agree with Lily that the Divination lesson had been a complete waste of time. Professor Trelawney had got them to each recount their most recent dream in turn, and the proceeded to explain why that meant they were destined for an early death, or at least a serious amount of misfortune.

"At least Hagrid won't predict our untimely death in Care of Magical Creatures," Hugo said, as they headed out of the oak front doors.

"Yeah, but maybe Trelawney's predictions will come true in Hagrid's lesson," Louis said darkly. It had been Kieran's turn to pick a quality for a magical creature last lesson, and he'd requested something terrifying.

The four of them joined the group forming by Hagrid's hut. Kieran and Alexander were noisily debating what creature Hagrid would be showing them. Dove Ackerley and her friends looked nervous – Mia expected they'd rather they stuck to 'pretty' creatures, such as unicorns. Mia thought that the lesson on unicorns had been the best lesson so far, but she was still looking forward to what Hagrid would deem 'terrifying'.

"Alrigh', are we all here?" Hagrid asked, looking around the group. "Now, Kieran, yeh wanted sommat 'terrifying?... the creature I'm gonna show yeh today, I don' think she's terrifying, but I guess some o' yeh might... alrigh', follo' meh."

He set off along the edge of the forest, with the second years hurrying to keep up. Within five minutes, they reached an enclosure. In the enclosure were two wizards, and a green scaly creature, about the size of a large dog.

"Is that a dragon?" Kieran asked.

"Uh huh," Hagrid nodded. "Name o' Gwensi. She's a Welsh Green, jus' a baby, really."

"Cool!" Alexander and Kieran said together.

"Unfortunately, I'm not allowed to let yeh into the enclosure wi' her – only meh NEWT students can do tha' - but I'll go in, an' try an' bring her this way so yeh can get a closer look."

"I'm not sure I want a closer look," Dove said nervously.

Lily rolled her eyes. "It's hardly going to eat you through the enclosure."

"No, but it might breathe fire," Dove returned.

Sure enough, the class watched as the dragon greeted Hagrid by breathing a jet of fire at him. He just dodged the flames and laughed. "Now, now Gwensi, no need t' be like tha', now is there?"

"Didn't Hagrid have a pet dragon once?" Hugo asked Lily.

"Yeah," Lily nodded. "Norbert, except she turned out to be Norberta, and she got sent to live with Uncle Charlie in Romania."

While they had been talking, Hagrid had lead Gwensi over to the edge of the enclosure, prompting everyone to take several steps backwards.

"Now then, don't be shy," Hagrid was saying. "Come an' take a closer look."

Most of the class looked like they'd rather take a week's worth of detention with Professor Duncan, but they nevertheless edged half a step forwards and peered at the dragon, who shot a jet of fire in their direction. Dove Ackerley screamed and ran backwards.

Hagrid spent the rest of the lesson talking about dragons, whilst the class alternated between watching Gwensi and retreating when she breathed fire. At the end of the lesson he set them an essay: four inches on why dragons were terrifying – or why they're not, Hagrid said, grinning – and another two on whether or not you'd like them for a pet, and why.

The next day, Halloween, seemed to drag by, even to Mia, until eventually it was time for the Halloween feast. As had been customary for the last few years, the four long house tables had disappeared, replaced with two dozen smaller, round ones. Each had a carved pumpkin in the middle, there were several hundred live bats hanging from the ceiling, and the Hogwarts ghosts were out in full force.

Lily, Mia and Hugo spotted Louis sat with Mac, Cassie and Zoe. The three of them went to join them, followed by the rest of the Gryffindor second years who made up the larger part of the gang. James, Fred and Chris were sat at the next table, enchanting their goblets to race each other around the glowing pumpkin.

"Good day?" Mac asked the second years.

"It was alright," Lily shrugged, answering for everyone, as usual. "Slow, though."

"I'm glad it's the weekend tomorrow," Mac sighed. "I've got so much homework to catch up on... whoa, what's she all dressed up for?"

Everyone craned their necks to look where he was looking. Mac's older sister Chlo was marching through the tables towards them. Instead of her usual black Hogwarts robes, she was wearing a very pretty blood red dress.

"She looks mad," Lily observed. "She's gonna yell at someone."

Mac nodded. "I hope it's not me."

Just before she reached their table, Chlo turned to the neighbouring table, where James was sat with Fred and Chris.

"Well, if you don't want me to sit with you, it would have been kinder just to tell me," she exploded, and everyone on the surrounding tables turned around to look.

"What – hey, there's room," James said. "Shove over Chris-"

"I asked you to wait for me, and you didn't!" Chlo said. "Some boyfriend you are!"  
"What – when?" James said. "You didn't – at lunch I said I'd see you down here."

"Yeah, an' then I sent you a MI and asked you to wait for me in the common room!" Chlo said. "But if you don't want to sit with me, that that's fine – maybe I don't want to sit with you."  
She turned and stalked off, ignoring James calling after her. "Wait! Chlo! I didn't get your MI, otherwise you know I would have waited for you! Chlo!"

"They never argue," Mac said incredulously, watching his sister walk away to the other side of the Great Hall and sit with some of her friends.

"Looks like they are now..."Louis said.


	13. Chapter 13: Salamanders and Siblings

Chapter Thirteen

Salamanders and Siblings

With November came the first frosts, and soon students were shivering between classes, hurrying to the relative warmth of the classrooms. Although James and Chlo had nominally made up after their fight on Halloween, the atmosphere between them was still frosty. With the addition of the constant fights between Rose and Scorp, Louis had started joking that it was colder inside the castle than out.

Danielle had upped Quidditch practice to twice a week, despite everyone's protests that they didn't even have another match until after Christmas. By the beginning of December, it had become customary for James and Fred to forcibly end each practice when they'd had enough by taking one of Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes notorious snack boxes, incapacitating themselves with nosebleeds, boils, or projectile vomit so that Danielle had no choice but to let the practice end.

Their last Care of Magical Creatures lesson of term was the day before they broke up for Christmas, and Mia walked through the grounds with Lily, Hugo and Louis, all trying to guess what Hagrid had in store for them. It had been Hugo's turn to choose a quality last lesson, and he'd requested something entertaining, despite Lily not so quietly campaigning for 'dangerous' in his ear.

When they reached Hagrid's hut, they found the rest of the class around a roaring bonfire.

"Ace!" Louis said, pushing in between Dove Ackerley and one of her friends to get closer to the heat.

"Watch it, Weasley," Dove scowled. "We were here first, you know."

Louis shrugged, running his hand through his silvery-blonde hair. Lily, Mia and Hugo found room by the bonfire too, and waited for Hagrid to start the lesson.

"So," he said when the whole class was assembled. "I've got summat entertaining for yeh today... now, who can guess why we've got a bonfire?"

"Because it's cold?" Louis suggested, glancing over at Dove. Most of the class laughed at this, but Mia noticed that Louis looked disappointed that Dove wasn't one of them.

"Not quite," Hagrid smiled. "Anyone?"

Dove put up her hand. "Salamanders," she said.

"Exactly," Hagrid grinned. "Five points teh Ravenclaw. Salamanders are fire-dwelling creatures. Look, there's one."

The class looked where he was pointing, those on the other side of the bonfire squashing round to get a better look. A small red lizard was emerging from the fire. As they watched, several more appeared, wandering over the outside of the bonfire briefly, before disappearing back into the flames.

"Cool!" Lily said. "I like salamanders."

"They're not as cool as the dragon was," Alexander said.

"Yeah, the dragon was epic," Kieran agreed.

"At least these don't breathe fire on you," Mia said, but the boys seemed to think that the fire-breathing was at least half of what had made the dragon so interesting.

For the rest of the lesson, the class watched the salamanders leaping in and out of the flames, whilst Hagrid talked to them about the properties of salamanders, and the potions their blood was used in.

"I'm not sure I'd want a salamander for a pet," Hugo said as they walked back up to the castle for dinner.

"I would," Lily said. "I love the way they jump in and out of the fire."

"Yeah, but you'd have to keep that fire going all the time," Hugo said. "Hagrid said they die if they're out of the fire for more than five or six hours. Sounds a bit high maintenance for me."  
"No more so than the dragon," Louis grinned.

"I never said I wanted a dragon for a pet!" Hugo protested. "That was Alexander and Kieran... strange people."

After dinner, they went up to the house common room, where Mac had started a game of exploding snap. Mia briefly considered doing some homework, but then decided it wasn't going to happen. Even if she managed to concentrate over the noise of the exploding snap game, two fifth year boys were involved in a chess game to which they had a very vocal audience; James, Fred and Chris were trying to sell some Bouncing Baubles; Rose and Scorp were arguing; and, to cap it all, Peeves was floating upside-down in the middle of the room, singing rude versions of Christmas carols at the top of his voice.

So she sat down, along with Lily and Hugo, as Lily demanded that Mac, "deal us in!"

Mac did so, and soon their shrieks and explosions were added to the din in the house common room.

"You know, muggles our age find snap boring," Mia told the gang at large after a particularly big explosion.

"That's because their cards don't explode," Mac grinned. "The look on my muggle cousins' faces when I told them snap's one of the more popular past times at Hogwarts..."

As eight o'clock approached, the Gryffindor second years headed up to Gryffindor tower, followed by Peeves, who had progressed from singing Christmas carols to making up rhymes about each of them. Strains of his songs followed them up the stairs:

Oh fiery Flowerpot, she's a trial alright

Her mischievous antics keep Peevsie up at night

She drinks all the Firewhisky til she's high as a kite

Til she can't cast a spell, try as she might

Oh fiery Flowerpot...

They finally got rid of him on the fifth floor, when he spotted a pair of first year Ravenclaws, and decided they'd make a much more interesting target than the Gryffindors, who were just ignoring him.

"You don't drink Firewhisky, though, do you?" Hugo asked Lily as they climbed through the portrait hole.

"No!" Lily said indignantly. "And if I did, I wouldn't tell Peeves!"

When they entered the Gryffindor common room, it was immediately clear that there was no point trying to do any work in here either – everyone was just in too much of a holiday mood. Instead, Lily, Mia and Hugo sat by the fire, and Lily and Hugo tried to tell Mia everything they knew about each of the teams in the national Quidditch league.

At about nine o'clock, Roxanne and her friend Lottie came in through the portrait hole and over to where Lily, Mia and Hugo were all sat on a sofa by the fire.

"Oi, let us sit down," Roxanne said. "We're exhausted."  
"No," Lily said indignantly. "We were here first – find your own seat."

But the sofa seemed to have decided that Roxanne and Lottie needed to sit down more than Lily, Mia and Hugo did. Without warning, the cushions pitched forwards, hurling the three of them onto the floor, where they lay sprawled in front of the fire.

"Cheers, sofa," Roxanne grinned, as she and Lottie sat down on the newly vacated sofa.

"So, what have you been up to that's made you so exhausted?" Hugo asked, as he, Lily and Mia picked themselves up from the floor.

"Big sibling – little sibling Christmas party," Roxanne groaned.

"The what?" Lily asked, squashing inbetween Roxanne and Lottie on the sofa.

"Big sibling – little sibling Christmas party," Roxanne repeated. "Didn't I tell you about the big sibling thing? It's new this year – every third year gets a first year to be a big sibling to. You know, like we're supposed to look after them, make sure they're settling in alright, and they can come to us if they have problems."

"And it's a nightmare," Lottie put in.

"Don't tell me you've got Luci Hamel," Lily asked Roxanne.

"No, I have," Lottie said. "She's a nightmare. She'd be perfectly happy if I didn't have anything to do with her, but I'll get in trouble with Professor Longbottom if I don't."

"I've got Ailie Abercrombie," Roxanne said. "She's got a brother in your year, hasn't she? She literally never stops talking, and she's always got a question about something. It's exhausting just watching her, let alone talking to her."

"How come we didn't get big siblings last year?" Lily asked.

"Because she just said it was new this year," Hugo sighed. "Sometimes I think you need your hearing testing, Lily."

Lily poked her tongue out at him, and then turned back to Roxanne and Lottie. "So we'll have to have a little sibling next year."

"Unless they decide we were a complete failure this year and scrap to scheme," Lottie said.

"We could always be a complete failure so you won't have to do it," Roxanne grinned.

"I think it sounds fun," Mia protested.

"Just wait until you've had an earful of Ailie Abercrombie asking you why Peeves is still here, and who planted the Whomping Willow, and whether there are really giants in the Forbidden Forest," Roxanne scowled. "Then let's see how fun you find it."

The next day, Friday, flew by. Most teachers allowed them to slack off in lessons, although Professor Duncan still demanded their full attention, and in Herbology last period they managed to get another story out of Professor Longbottom. He told them the story of how he had beheaded Voldermort's snake, Nagini, with the sword of Gryffindor.

On Saturday after breakfast, everyone who was going home for Christmas, which was most of the school, got in the horseless carriages which took them to Hogsmede Station and the Hogwarts Express.

On the train back to London, all the Weasley's squashed into a compartment together.

"You know, I've always wondered what a Hogwarts Christmas is like..." James mused, perched on the back of a seat with Lily sat on his feet.

"Mmm," Louis agreed. "But then, Christmas isn't really Christmas unless you're at Grimmauld Pace."

"Grimmauld Place is the place to be," Fred agreed. "But you know, if we keep having Christmas at Grimmauld Place when we're all grown up with our own families we're going to run out of room."

"And we haven't already?" Rose grinned. "We have to put up tents so everyone has space to sleep."

"It won't be long before we started getting a new generation of Weasleys," Dominique, Louis' sister, said. "Teddy and Vic are getting married in the summer, and I doubt it'll be long before they start having kids."

"And goodness knows where we'll put them at Christmas," Al said.

Mia thought that she'd like to experience a Weasley Christmas, and a Hogwarts one, but for her, Christmas would never really be Christmas unless she was at home with her parents.

Sorry for the length of time between updates! I've been really busy with Uni, but I'm finished for the summer now, so hopefully updates will be more frequent.


	14. Chapter Fourteen: Dove Ackerley

A/N: Sorry for the very long gap between updates - I have actually got all of this and Year Three written, but real life has just kept getting in the way. However, I've just finished University, and so the plan is to post one chapter per day. It's all un-beta'd, so read at your own peril! And now, without any further ado, I present to you: Chapter Fourteen!

Chapter Fourteen

Dove Ackerley

"Louis' got a girlfriend, Louis' got a girlfriend!"  
Hugo came dancing into the inter-house common room after dinner on the first full day back after Christmas, Louis following more sedately.

They'd got back to Hogwarts late on Sunday evening, and then lessons had begun Monday morning. Mia already had homework for Transfiguration, History of Magic, Potions, and Modern History of Magic. She'd just got started on her potions essay when Hugo and Louis came into the common room.

"Who? Who?" Lily asked excitedly, as Louis said,

"Shut up, Hugo."

"Dove Ackerley," Hugo said, and Mia's wasn't surprised. She'd seen the way Louis had spent all of their last Care of Magical Creatures lesson before Christmas trying to get Dove to notice him.

"Dove?" Lily said. "Why?"

"Why not?" Louis scowled.

"She's a... a little featherhead," Lily said.

"She's in Ravenclaw," Louis said. "That means she's got brains."

"I didn't mean she hasn't got brains," Lily said. "Just that all she cares about is her appearance."

"And why shouldn't she?" Louis said angrily. "She looks great."

Mia snorted.

"Shut up," Louis laughed.

"What I want to know is how on earth you managed to get her to go out with you," Mia said.

Lily and Hugo laughed.

"I didn't mean it like that," Mia protested. "Just that she wasn't very interested in you before Christmas."

"I wrote to her," Louis shrugged.

"Stalker, muchly," Lily said.

"I just wrote to her," Louis said. "I didn't like declare my undying love for her or anything, I just said..." he started going red and then stopped talking. "Aaanyway..."

Everyone laughed.

"So where is the love of your life now?" Lily grinned.

"Getting books from her dormitory," Louis said. "Then we're gonna work on the Modern History essay together."

"Because we're just not cool enough for you," Hugo said.

"Pretty much," Louis shrugged. "Oh, there she is."

Everyone looked over to the door where Dove had just waked in. Louis got up and walked over to her, and Lily, Mia and Hugo watched as the two of them found a table together.

"Dove Ackerley?" Lily said as the three of them turned back to their work.

"He could've chosen worse," Hugo shrugged.

"Yeah, like Ilonka or something," Mia said. "Dove's just a bit full of herself."  
"Her and Louis both," Hugo grinned. "I predict it won't last – no relationship's big enough for both their egos."

"What, like Rose and Scorp?" Lily asked.

"Nah, they just like arguing too much," Hugo grinned. "Anyway... Potions." He dipped his quill in some ink and started writing.

The three of them all settled down to work, occasionally stealing glances over at Louis and Dove. Dove was deep in her work, one had furiously writing, the other rested on her textbook, holding it open. Mia watched as Louis surreptitiously walked his fingers across the table and rested his hand on top of Dove's. She looked up at him and smiled, blushing.

The Gryffindors' first lesson the following morning was Potions. All the way down from breakfast, Lily and Hugo entertained Mia with tales of their Christmas at Number 12, Grimmauld Place, and Lily was still at it when they sat down at their usual table in the dungeon classroom.

"How was your Christmas, Luci?" Mia asked, as Lily started repeating the James-and-Fred-and-the-exploding-Christmas-pudding story for Zoe, who'd just caught the end of it. "Did you spent it in Switzerland?"

Luci nodded. "We always spend Christmas at my grandparents' house," she said, briefly glancing up from her textbook. "It was nice."

"What about you, Cassie?" Mia asked. "You stayed here over Christmas, didn't you? How come?"

"My parents were abroad," Cassie shrugged, her head buried in her textbook in a very Luci-like fashion.

"What were they abroad for?" Mia asked as Professor Cooke entered the room.

"Work," Cassie replied, and, as Professor Cooke started the lesson at that point, she couldn't elaborate.

After Potions, the Gryffindors headed outside for Herbology, whilst the Hufflepuffs went upstairs for Charms. All the way down to the greenhouses, Luci walked with Mia and a very reluctant Lily, but when they reached the group of Slytherins already waiting outside Greenhouse Two, she predictably went to stand with Ilonka and her sheep.

"She should stay away from Ilonka..." Lily scowled.

Mia sighed. There really was no pleasing Lily sometimes – she'd complained when Luci had hung around with them all the time, and now she was friendly with Ilonka, Lily didn't like that either. "Give her a break, Lily. She can be friends with whoever she wants."

"But she's a Gryffindor, and Ilonka's a Slytherin," Lily said.

"So?" Mia said. "People in different houses can be friends – we're not in the Dark Ages, Lily. And we're friends with Louis, and Mac, and Zoe, and Cassie, and they're not in Gryffindor. And-" she continued, knowing that Lily was about to say that Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw weren't Slytherin "-and we're friends with Theo and Ruby, and they're Slytherins."

"Yeah, but they're alright, Ilonka's not," Lily said.

"Then it's Ilonka you have a problem with, not Slytherins," Mia said. "And you generalize that problem with Ilonka to being with all Slytherins."

"So what if I do?" Lily shrugged.

"So it's not fair on all the decent Slytherins," Mia told her.

"But it still means Luci shouldn't be friends with Ilonka," Lily insisted.

"Maybe not, but that doesn't mean you should decide that for her – let her make her own choices, and her own mistakes."

It was the last lesson before dinner before the Gryffindor had anything with the Ravenclaws. As the class filed into double History of Magic, Mia and Lily took up their usual places at the back, with Hugo just in front of them. Louis, however, didn't join them, instead sitting on the other side of the classroom with Dove.

"What are you doing over there?" Hugo demanded as the classroom filled up around them.

"Sitting with my girlfriend," Louis grinned.

Hugo rolled his eyes and turned around in his seat to face Lily and Mia. "So I have to sit through an hour and a half of Binns all by myself?" he sighed.

"You can turn round and talk to us," Mia told him. "Once Binns gets started he won't notice."

"I'm not sure I like this whole Louis having a girlfriend thing," Hugo said.

"Maybe you should get yourself one too?" Lily suggested, grinning.

Hugo pulled a face, and Lily and Mia laughed. "I'm twelve," Hugo said. "I do not want a girlfriend. Yet. I'm not even a teenager!"

Professor Binns floated through the wall next to the open door, and everyone pretended to listen to him for the first five minutes, before going back to their conversations. Mia managed to copy down an occasional name or date, but for the most part she paid little attention. Alexander and Kieran were quietly disarming each other, in front of Hugo. Derek Downer and Andy Cattermole were playing hangman on a scrap of parchment in the front row. Dove was dozing off, her head resting on Louis' shoulder as he played with her hair.

"What was that lesson even about?" Hugo yawned as he walked down to dinner with Lily and Mia. Louis had gone on ahead with Dove – they were just visible at the end of the corridor, hand in hand, Louis carrying Dove's bag as well as his own.

"Goblin wars?" Mia suggested.

"Witch burning?" Lily offered.

"Well, I thought I heard the international statute of secrecy mentioned..." Hugo mused. "History of Magic really is a waste of time."

"Agreed," Lily sighed, as they reached the bottom of the stairs down into the Entrance Hall. At the Gryffindor table, they found seats opposite James, Fred and Chris, and started helping themselves to large servings of steak and kidney pie.

"Who's that girl Louis is practically hanging off of?" James demanded, looking over Mia's shoulder at the Ravenclaw table.

"Dove Ackerley," Hugo told him, his mouth full of pie.

"Dull who?" James asked.

"_Dove_ Ackerley," Mia corrected him, giggling. "She's in our year, Ravenclaw. They started going out yesterday."

Hugo swallowed his mouthful. "Only after Louis practically stalked her over Christmas," he said.

"Aren't you lot all a bit young to start dating?" James asked. "Chlo and I didn't start going out until the end of fourth year."

"There was that time you snogged Ruthie Blue in third year, though..." Chris mused.

"That was a dare!" James protested. "_You_ dared me to do it."

"Hey, Ruthie!" Fred called to a girl with electric blue hair who was sitting a few places along from Hugo.

"What?" Ruthie said, looking up from her chocolate gateaux.

"Remember third year, when you snogged James?" Fred grinned.

"I think you'll find he kissed me, actually," Ruthie said.

"Details," Fred shrugged. "So, you've already proved you'd snog the son of the Chosen One – would you snog his cousin?"

"In your dreams, Weasley," Ruthie said, rolling her eyes and turning back to her pudding.

Fred turned back to James, Chris, Lily, Mia and Hugo, grinning. "She likes me," he said confidently.

"She thinks you're an idiot," James told him bluntly.

"So what?" Fred shrugged. "I am an idiot."

"Well," Lily said. "You _can_ date her, so long as it's only casual."

"Who gave you permission to dictate my love life?" Fred demanded.

"What love life?" James snorted, as Lily elaborated,

"You said you weren't going to get serious until you're at least forty. So no serious relationships for you!"

"Or any at all, judging by Ruthie's attitude," Chris grinned.


	15. Chapter Fifteen: Intrepid Explorers

Chapter Fifteen

Intrepid Explorers

As a soggy January became a snowy February, Mia found her workload increasing, with both the teachers upping the pressure in the classroom, and Danielle on the Quidditch pitch.

"You know, I've heard my dad talk about how much of a slave driver Danielle's dad was when he was Quidditch captain," Fred sighed, sinking into an armchair in the Gryffindor common room after a particularly lengthy practice on the second Thursday in February. "I think Danielle's turning into him."

"We really don't need to practice this much," Roxanne said, collapsing into the armchair next to her brother.

"Don't let Danielle hear you say that," James grinned. "Or she'll accuse you of not taking this whole thing seriously, of not wanting to win the Quidditch cup. But I do think the Woods take Quidditch far too seriously.

"Apart from Chris," Fred put in, watching their friend walk across the common room towards them. "He couldn't give a toss."

"Nope, Chris is the ugly duckling, alright," James said, obviously enjoying the look of bewilderment on Chris' face.

"I think it's a double legacy thing," Samuel said. "You know – both our parents were on the Gryffindor team when they were at Hogwarts. It's just the atmosphere we grew up in."

"Yeah, well so did I – so did Fred and Roxy, for that matter," James said. "And we don't all obsess over endless practices. Quidditch is a laugh. I wouldn't be playing it if I didn't enjoy it."

Mia stood up. "Well, I'm going to do some homework," she said. "See you whenever we next have practice."

"Which, knowing Danielle, will probably be Saturday or something," Fred grinned.

"It better not be," James said indignantly. "It's a Hogsmede weekend – and Valentine's Day."

"You and Chlo going to spend it holed up in Madam Puddifoot's?" Fred sniggered.

"Are you gonna ask Ruthie out?" James returned.

Mia walked across the common room to where Lily and Hugo were sat, the noise of James and Fred arguing blending into the general noise of the Common Room.

"How was practice?" Hugo asked, looking up from his Herbology essay.

"Long," Mia sighed, shifting Lily's bag onto the floor so she could sit down. "I mean, yeah, sure, we need to practice... but that was well over two hours."

Hugo turned back to his essay as Mia looked in her bag for her quill so she could make a start on her homework. Lily was reading the chapter of the _Standard Book of Spells, Grade Two_ which Professor Duncan had set for homework, doodling in the margin as she did so.

"I'm bored," Hugo said at length, laying down his quill and looking up at Lily and Mia.

"Good for you," Lily yawned, not looking up from her book.

"Let's go do something," Hugo said.

"Like what?" Mia asked, inadvertently blotting her parchment as she looked up at him.

"Let's – scourgify – go to Astronomy early," Hugo grinned, siphoning off the excess ink for her.

"Boring," Lily said.

"I don't mean actually go – we could go for a wander – explore."  
"We've already explored the castle heaps, though," Mia pointed out.

"Yeah, but not at night," Lily said, seizing on the idea. "We could MI Louis, get him to meet us... and we can't even get in trouble, because we can just say we were leaving for Astronomy early, because..."

"Because we heard Peeves had blocked the corridor, so we knew we'd have to find a long way round," Hugo supplied. "I found this secret door a little way up the corridor, but I don't know where it goes – we could explore that."

"Yeah!" Lily said. "I'll MI Louis – tell him to meet us outside the portrait hole in half an hour. I'll tell him you've found a door."

Mia wasn't entirely sure this was a good idea – she was fairly certain most teachers would see through their story instantly – but she knew there was no point arguing with Lily once she'd made up her mind about something. Besides, it _did _sound fun.

Lily quickly scribbled a MI to Louis, and Mia and Hugo signed it after her. Lily launched the paper aeroplane across the common room, but none of them bothered to watch it go. They all turned back to their work, trying to get a bit more done before they met Louis.

Just before ten thirty, the three of them packed away their homework and headed for their portrait hole.

"Wouldn't it be awful if we got caught now, before we even met Louis, or did any exploring?" Lily said, as they waited outside the portrait hole.

"Where is he...?" Hugo wondered aloud. "D'you think he's coming?"

"He'd've MI'd if he wasn't," Mia reasoned.

They had to wait almost ten minutes before Louis appeared, strolling down the corridor, hand in hand with Dove.

"I didn't say to bring _her_," Lily said indignantly. "And what took you so long?"

"I'm his girlfriend, and I wanted to come," Dove sniffed, tossing her long dark hair over her shoulders.

"And if you wanted us here at a specific time, then you should have specified, instead of just saying 'half an hour'," Louis told her.

"'I'm his girlfriend, I wanted to come'," Lily mimicked, also tossing her hair over her shoulders.

"Girls," Hugo sighed. "Stop it, Lily – let's go explore."

"Where exactly is this secret door of yours?" Louis asked.

"Just up here... I found it last week..." Hugo said, walking up the corridor with the others following. "I don't know where it goes – didn't have time to explore." He felt his way along the wall. "I'm sure it's somewhere around here..."

"Maybe it's moved," Mia suggested – doors at Hogwarts did tend to.

"Aha!" Hugo said, grasping a door handle out of thin air, and opening a door, which slowly materialised out of the panelled wall.

"How do you find these things, Hugo?" Mia asked incredulously.

Hugo shrugged. "I was...uh..." he started to go red.

"You were what?" Lily demanded.

"I was... uh... I ... you know, I had my hand on the wall when I was walking along... because... well, you know, the panelling... it feels nice, doesn't it?"

They all looked at him like he was crazy.

"It does!" Hugo protested. "Anyway... yeah, and then I found the door handle. Let's go see where it goes."  
The five of them walked through the door, Mia shut it behind them, and they were plunged into total darkness. Dove shrieked.

"Shut up, idiot," Lily hissed. "D'you want us to be caught? Lumos."

The light from Lily's wand tip barely illuminated the dark passageway. The others all lit their wands too.

"This way," Hugo said quietly, leading the way down the passageway. The walls were made of the same wooden panelling as the main corridor, and there were paintings hung at intervals along the walls. Mia lifted her wand higher so she could look at them.

"Uhg." Mia recoiled as she saw the portrait of a witch with three heads, each one more ugly and vicious than the last. All three heads were leering down at her.

"This must be where they keep all the paintings that are too gruesome to have on display," Louis said, peering up at a picture which depicted a wizard being beheaded – his head kept being magically reattached to his neck, just so he could be beheaded again and again.

"It's horrible," Dove shuddered.

"Let's keep going," Hugo said, moving off down the passageway.

The five of them walked on, trying not to look at the paintings and ignore the voices that called down at them from either side.

"I suppose this does go somewhere..." Lily said, after about five minutes of twists and turns. The floor had been gradually sloping downwards for the past few minutes, but showed no signs of coming to an end.

"It must do," Hugo said confidently. "It's got to go _somewhere_."  
"I don't like it," Dove shuddered. "What if we're trapped in here forever?"

"We won't be," Louis told her. "If we really can't find a way out soon, we can always go back the way we came."  
"But we will find a way out," Hugo said, turning around to face the others, walking backwards. "Because it has to go somewhere. It can't just go nowh-"

He stopped abruptly, having walked into a solid wall.

"It's a dead end!" Dove said.

"There's probably another hidden door," Lily said scornfully "Feel for the handle, Hugo."

Hugo started stroking the panelled wall, which set Louis off into a laughing fit.

"Aha!" Hugo said eventually, seizing the invisible handle, which was at knee height this time, and opened the hidden doorway.

They all blinked at the light and extinguished their wands as they stepped out into the corridor.

"Where are we?" Mia mused as the door melted into the wall behind them. The corridor was familiar, but it was hard to get her bearings because she was seeing it in isolation, rather than as part of the castle as a whole.

"I think it's the Transfiguration corridor..." Louis said at length.

"It is indeed the Transfiguration corridor," a voice said coldly. "Which begs the question – what are four second years doing standing in it at eleven o'clock at night?"

Professor Duncan walked out of a door which Mia recognised as the Transfiguration classroom. The five of them froze.

"Well?" he demanded.

"We were... going to Astronomy," Louis said lamely.

"And we heard Peeves was blocking a corridor, so we thought we better set off early," Lily added.

Mia could tell Professor Duncan wasn't buying it. He gave them all a penetrating stare and then spoke, "If I am to believe you were heading from your 7th floor common room _up_ to the Astronomy tower, then why is it that I have found you here, on the 5th floor?" he asked icily.

"We... we..." Hugo stammered. "We found a secret passage that we thought might be a shortcut... but it turned out it wasn't."  
"Or, you thought you would attempt to use a legitimate lesson as an excuse for some night time wandering," Professor Duncan corrected him. "I will see the... uh... five of you in my office at ten o'clock on Saturday morning, where you will serve detention."  
"But-" Dove began.

Professor Duncan held up a hand to silence her. "And you will each lose twenty points from your respective houses," he said. "I will now escort you up to the Astronomy tower, since you were so keen to get to your lesson."

They followed him gloomily up the stairs. Professor Sinistra was teaching a class of fourth years which included Rose and Albus. She was annoyed at being interrupted, and after Professor Duncan had explained why a quarter of her next class was so early, told them that they could just stand quietly and wait, so the five of them had to stand in a very bored silence for forty minutes until the rest of the class arrived.

All in all, their night time wandering had not been a success.


	16. Chapter Sixteen: Break-ups and Make-ups

Chapter Sixteen

Break-ups and Make-ups

"Hey, high fives all round, guys," James said the next morning at breakfast, as he, Fred and Chris sat down opposite Lily, Mia and Hugo.

"Why?" Lily asked grumpily, playing with her porridge.

"Detention, with Duncan, again," Fred grinned.

"Making a habit of it, are you?" Chris asked.

"Go away," Lily grumped.

"Just because you guys seem to _like_ getting detention..." Hugo said.

"We think it's a bit of a laugh," James shrugged. "It shows the teachers are taking notice of you."

"That's not a good thing," Mia said. "Now we have to spend Saturday morning in detention... with Professor Duncan of all people."

"It's not like you would've been able to go to Hogsmede anyway," Fred reasoned.

"Yeah, but with everyone else gone, we would've had the run of the castle, and the grounds," Hugo reasoned. "We could've done some more exploring."

"You and your exploring!" Lily said. "All it does is get us into trouble."

"I seem to remember you were pretty keen last night," Hugo said indignantly.

"We ought to get to Transfiguration," Mia told them, not really fancying an argument this early in the day.

"More Professor Duncan," Hugo sighed as the three of them stood up. "Like we haven't seen enough of him already recently. Wasn't it unfortunate that the passage came out in the Transfiguration corridor?"

"And we have to put up with Louis and lovey-Dove in Transfiguration," Lily sighed.

Mia and Hugo both laughed at the new nickname for Louis' girlfriend. As the three of them walked out of the Great Hall, they passed Josh Young, who was sat a few places along from James, Fred and Chris, and was looking extremely disgruntled about something.

When they reached the 5th floor, they joined the rest of the class, waiting outside. Hugo started stroking the wall opposite the classroom door.

"You're not looking for that secret passage again, are you?" Louis asked, walking over. "Hasn't it already got us into enough trouble?"

"Where's lovey-Dove?" Lily asked, looking around. Over the past month, it had become usual to see Dove hanging onto Louis' arm, so it was odd to see him without her.

"I ditched her," Louis shrugged.

"_When_?" Mia asked, incredulous.

"Breakfast," Louis said. "She was having a go at me for getting her detention, even though she wanted to come, and anyway, I was starting to get bored of her. All she ever wants to talk about is herself, and does her hair look good, and what colour should she paint her nails next."

Just then, Dove came down the corridor, surrounded by a group of her friends, who all glared at Louis, as he grinned lazily, running his hand though his hair.

Hugo elbowed him. "You really are awful," he told him.

"What?" Louis shrugged. "I can't help it if the women find me irresistible."

Professor Duncan opened the door and ushered the class inside. Lily, Mia, Hugo and Louis sat with Luci in the third row. Dove sat with her friends as far away from Louis as possible. Louis spent the entirety of the lesson muttering snide remarks about Professor Duncan into Hugo's ear, or surreptitiously sabotaging the tea cup Hugo was supposed to be turning into a rat whenever his back was turned.

Hugo eventually caught him, right at the end of the lesson, turning his rat's carefully transformed tail back into a handle.

"Oi!" he said, and then he grinned, picked the rat up by the handle and deposited it on Louis perfectly groomed hair. "It's good to have you back, mate."

Professor Duncan glared at the two of them, and took ten points each from Gryffindor and Ravenclaw. They boys didn't seem to care – Hugo was glad to have his best friend back, and Louis was his usual cheerful self, in stark contrast to Dove, who pushed past the four of them in the doorway.

"I'd hazard a guess Dove's not taking the breakup too well," Mia said as the four of them walked down the corridor together.

"Well, it's her own fault!" Louis said. "She wanted to come exploring, but then it's somehow my fault when we get caught."

Lily, Mia and Hugo parted with Louis on the second floor, as they headed down the charms corridor, and Louis headed downstairs, as he had Herbology next.

"I don't think I'll ever understand Louis," Hugo said bemusedly as they sat down in Professor Flitwick's class, "but Hogwarts wouldn't be the same without him."

When Lily, Mia and Hugo left Gryffindor tower the next morning, Valentine's Day, they found Scorpius sat in the corridor beside the Fat Lady's portrait.

"Guys, can you let me in?" he asked the three of them. "I need to see Rose, and she-" he jabbed his thumb at the Fat Lady "-won't let me in."

"I should think not!" the Fat Lady said indignantly. "You're not a Gryffindor, and you don't know the password."  
No one paid her any attention.

"What's this, some sweeping romantic gesture for Valentine's?" Lily asked.

"Not exactly," Scorp said. "I...uh... kinda broke up with her last night, and obviously I didn't mean anything of it, so I need to sort stuff out... I've already sent her six MIs this morning, but she hasn't replied. So... can you like let me in?"

"Don't you think it's time you and Rose called it a day?" Hugo asked. "All you seem to do is break up."  
"That's just how we are," Scorp shrugged. "I just need to talk to her – c'mon guys. If you won't let me in, then maybe you could bring her out here?"

The girls both looked at Hugo. "Your sister, your choice," Lily shrugged.

Hugo considered for a minute. "Alright," he said eventually. "I guess we can either tell her you're here, or just try and get her to come down for breakfast, and you can just happen to be here."

"I expect the latter would have the most promising results," Scorp said. "Thanks guys."

"_Amortentia_," Hugo said to the Fat Lady, who reluctantly swung forward to admit the three second years. They crossed the room, and stopped at the foot of the girl's staircase. "I can't go up there," Hugo said. "My dad told me the steps turn into a slide if a boy tries."

Lily giggled. "I'll go."

Mia grabbed her arm. "You're not exactly the queen of subtlety," she said, borrowing a phrase from Mac. "I'll go."

When she reached the fourth year girls' dormitory, Mary Cattermole was just coming out.

"How's Rose?" Mia asked her.

"Sulking," Mary grimaced. "Did Scorpius send you? The portraits say he's been sat outside the portrait hole all night."

"Yeah," Mia nodded. "I said I'd persuade her to come down to breakfast, and then Scorp would just happen to be there."

"I'll get her," Mary said. "She's always a nightmare when she's on the outs with Scorp." She opened the door and Mia watched as she walked over to the bed, where Rose was sitting, fully clothed, hugging her knees and staring out of the window.

"Come on," Mary said briskly, pulling her to her feet. "You and I are going down to breakfast, and then we're going to Hogsmede as strong, independent witches who don't need boys."

Rose reluctantly followed Mary and Mia down into the common room, where they met Lily and Hugo. The five of them walked to the portrait hole.

"What are you doing here?" Rose demanded, when she saw Scorpius standing in the corridor. "I'm going back to bed." She made as if to go back into Gryffindor tower.

"Rose, wait!" Scorp said, grabbing her arm.

"Let go of me!" Rose said, trying to pull away from him.

"After you hear me out," Scorp said. "C'mon Rose, you know I didn't mean any of that stuff last night."

"I also know you can't face going to Hogsmede alone on Valentine's Day," Rose said, still trying to pull free of his grasp.

"Well, there is that," Scorp grinned.

"Let go of me, you butthead – you're hurting me," Rose said.

"Butthead?" Scorp asked, relaxing his grip on her arm. "Really? Is that the best insult you've got?"

"Stuck-up," Rose scowled. Mia could tell she was close to cracking under the pressure of his charm offensive. "Full of yourself. Idiot..." she sighed. "Bloody irresistible."

Scorp grinned and wrapped his arms around her. "I love you," he told her.

"Prove it..." Rose said, her lips curling into a smile momentarily before they were indistinguishable from his.

As they started kissing, Hugo turned and led the way down the corridor. "I don't think I'll ever understand those two," he sighed.

After breakfast, Lily, Mia, Hugo and Louis headed up to the fifth floor for their detention. When they reached the Transfiguration classroom, Dove was already there, stood by the door. Hugo wondered over to the other side of the corridor and started stroking the wall again.

"Uhrg – why don't you just leave that flipping door alone?" Lily demanded.

"There's nothing wrong with _looking_," Hugo scowled. "In the day time it's just another shortcut."  
"Or a long cut, more like," Louis grinned, glancing over at Dove, who scowled and turned away.

At ten o'clock, Professor Duncan came out into the corridor.

"You three Gryffindors are to go down to Greenhouse One, where you will assist Professor Longbottom," he told Lily, Mia and Hugo. "And you two can come in here and help me."

Dove looked horrified at having to spend her detention alone with Louis. "Can't I-" she began, but Professor Duncan cut across her.

"You will do exactly as you are told, Miss Ackerley," he told her. "This is detention – you do not get options. Inside."

Louis and Dove walked into the classroom, Dove still trying to stay as far away from Louis as possible.

"What are you three waiting for?" Professor Duncan snapped at Lily, Mia and Hugo. "Off you go – Professor Longbottom's waiting."

The three of them set off along the corridor.

"I wonder what Professor Longbottom will make us do..." Lily mused as they embarked on a shortcut which would skip the fourth floor. "I hope it's something exciting and dangerous."

"In Greenhouse One?" Hugo scoffed. "Boring and monotonous, more like."

The work their head of house had for them was indeed boring and monotonous. For almost three hours he had them sweeping up dirt and plant cuttings, and cleaning and polishing gardening tools, all muggle-style, with no magic allowed. They had to work in silence, and Lily got roundly told off when she asked if Professor Longbottom would tell them War Stories to pass the time while they worked.

When they were eventually allowed to go to lunch, the three of them were all tired, dirty and very hungry.


	17. Chapter Seventeen: Furnunculus

Chapter Seventeen

Furnunculus

The Great Hall was almost empty when Lily, Mia and Hugo made their way in for lunch. Only the first and second years were present, as well as a handful of older students, who, for one reason or another, had elected not to go to Hogsmede. Many students were sitting at other house tables – Zoe and Cassie were at the Gryffindor table with some of their fellow second years, and Mia could see Luci Hamel sat at the Slytherin table with Ilonka.

Mia followed Lily and Hugo to the middle of the Gryffindor table, where their fellow second years were sat.

"How was detention?" Kieran Finnigan grinned. It hadn't taken log for the story of their night-time wandering to spread.

"Boring," Lily sighed, sitting down next to Cassie.

"Tiring," Mia added, sitting down next to Lily.

"And dirty," Hugo said, also sitting down, still picking dirt from beneath his fingernails.

"Where are Louis and Dove?" Alice Longbottom asked, craning her neck to look at the Ravenclaw table. "Didn't they have detention too?"

"Yeah, but they did it separately to us," Mia explained, reaching for a sandwitch.

They'd all almost finished eating when Louis and Dove finally appeared. Dove shot Louis one final dirty look, before going to join her friends at the Ravenclaw table. Louis looked around, discovered most of the gang were sat at the Gryffindor table, and came over to sit opposite Hugo.

"How was _your_ detention?" Hugo asked him, offering him a plate of sandwiches.

"Annoying," Louis said shortly. "Dove's still not talking to me."

"Considering you broke up with her yesterday, I'm, not surprised," Alexander said.

Louis sighed. "I just wish we could go back to being friends, you know?"

That night in the Inter-House Common, the older students were all full of tales of their day in Hogsmede, their pockets bursting with Honeydukes sweets, and Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes products. Mac was sat on a table, surrounded by the gang, and recounting how he'd single-handedly caused the entirety of Madam Puddifoot's tea shop to evacuate, due to a handful of dungbombs and a pygmy puff. He'd got detention and banned from the next Hogsmede weekend, but that didn't seem to bother him.

Rose and Scorp were sat in an armchair in the corner, limbs entwined and lips firmly glued together. Everyone was torn between determinedly _not_ watching them, and intellectual curiosity about how often breathing was necessary.

James, unlike most of the students, wasn't happy. After getting evicted from Madam Puddifoots by Mac, he and Chlo had walked along the high street, until James had fallen flat on his face in the snow, due to a trip jinx from Josh Young. The two of them had then duelled, and apart from having purple blisters all over one side of his face which refused to budge, James now had an annoyed girlfriend, as Chlo had stormed back up to the castle in a huff, fed up of having a boyfriend who preferred 'petty dueling' to his girlfriend.

"So... Louis and Dove broke up?" Mac said, coming to the end of his story and surveying the group. "When did that happen?"

"Yesterday," Hugo told him.

"Dove doesn't look very happy about it," Mac observed, looking over to the other side of the room, where Dove was sat with the other Ravenclaw second year girls. "D'you... d'you reckon Louis'd mind if I...uh... went and comforted her?"

Mia looked over to where Louis was sat in front of a fireplace, blatantly flirting with Zoe. "No," she grinned. "I don't imagine he would."

As February melted into March, Danielle upped Quidditch practices to three nights a week, and tensions between the team members started to show.

"I don't know why Danielle's getting so freaked out by the upcoming match," James said one evening in the changing rooms as they were getting ready for yet another practice. Danielle had gone out to check on the conditions, after snapping at the team to hurry up and get ready, and there was mutiny brewing in the camp. "It's only Ravenclaw. We flattened Slytherin, and Hufflepuff steamrollered Rvenclaw. The only person who really needs to work is you, Sam."

Samuel grimaced. His opposite number on the Ravenclaw team was their 7th year captain, Matt Toft. He rode a Firebolt Blue, and was widely acknowledged as the best seeker Hogwarts had seen in years.

Danielle came back into the changing rooms. "Alright, you know the tactics we're working on. Mia, you've got to be rock solid – I don't want them scoring a single goal if we can help it. James and Fred, you and I have got score like mad, and get 150 points ahead as fast as we can, so it doesn't matter if Toft gets the snitch. Mary and Roxy, when Toft's after the snitch, you have to hit bludgers at him – it might be the only way to stop him. And Sam-"

"I've got to get the snitch before Toft does," Samuel said boredly. "I know, Danielle, so can you just shut up about it?"  
"But it's important, Sam – I wish you'd stop being so flippant about all this," Danielle said.

"I'm a seeker," Samuel said. "My job is to catch the snitch. I _know_."

"Right," James said briskly, clearly sensing that the brother and sister were in the mood for an all-out brawl. "Let's get going." He shouldered his broom and walked out onto the pitch, the rest of the team following.

The seven of them set to work with a will; the three chasers trying to put goals past Mia whilst she did her best to stop them; Roxanne and Mary alternating between being opposing and supporting beaters, and Samuel releasing the snitch and giving it a head start before haring off up the pitch after it. However, after almost an hour of being yelled at every time they made the tiniest of mistakes, everyone was getting fed up.

"I dropped the Quaffle!" James yelled at Danielle. "It was an accident! It happens! Get off my back!"

"None of you are taking this seriously!" Danielle yelled.

"Yeah, because I totally dropped the Quaffle on purpose!" James yelled back. "Perhaps if you weren't such a slave driver, we'd all be more co-operative!"

"Perhaps if you were more co-operative, I wouldn't have to be such a slave driver!" Danielle retorted.

"Dan, you know that makes no sense," Samuel said, flying over. "You're being an idiot, sis. Knock it off."

"I'm not-" Danielle began, but Fred cut across her.

"I say we should call it a day," he said.

"Mmm," James nodded. "Quit while we're ahead, before someone gets into a fight."

"I'm the Captain, and I say we carry on," Danielle snapped. "Samuel, release the snitch again, and-"

"Who votes to leave practice here for tonight?" Fred asked. The three boys raised their hands, slowly followed by Mary and Roxanne. Mia would've been quite happy to practice for longer, but not with Danielle yelling at her every time she fumbled a save. She raised her hand too.

"Sorry, Danielle – it's six to one," James told her. "I'll put the balls away – gimme the snitch, Sam."

"Fine!" Danielle practically screeched. "Have it your way! And if we lose the match next week, on your heads be it." She tilted her broom forwards and streaked towards the ground.

The rest of the team made their way back up to the castle in a slower, more subdued fashion.

"She'll've cooled off by Thursday," James said. "You know Danielle."

"We will be alright for the Ravenclaw match, won't we?" Mia asked.

"Course," Roxanne grinned. "We beat 'em last year, even though these two trolls had got themselves detention."

James and Fred smiled reminiscently at the memory.

The next afternoon, the Gryffindor second years had double Herbology with the Slytheirns. As usual, Professor Longbottom got them to pair up, and then grouped the pairs into fours, careful to mix up Gryffindors and Slytherins. Mia and Lily were paired with Ilonka, Brooke and Luci.

Ilonka trod on Lily's toes as the five of them all converged on the shrivelfig they were supposed to be repotting.

"Hey!" Lily scowled.

"Oh, sorry," Ilonka said sarcastically. "I didn't see your feet. They must've been obscured by your massive head."

Lily drew her wand and pointed it at Ilonka's face. "Say that again?" she growled.

"You're so full of yourself, you think everyone should bow down and worship you, just because your dad is the boy-who-lived, and-"

"Furnunculus!" Lily said. Immediately, large boils started appearing on Ilonka's arms and face.

"Sir!" Ilonka howled. "She jinxed me!"

Professor Longbottom came over and performed the counter-curse before rounding on Lily. "Don't let me _ever_ catch you doing that again!" he shouted. "Not in my class, and not anywhere! I seem to recall it's not long since you've been in detention – would you like another one?"

"No," Lily said defiantly.

"Then perhaps you ought to refrain from duelling," Professor Longbottom said.

"It takes two to duel," Lily scowled, glaring at Ilonka, who was smirking.

"Then perhaps I phrased my sentence incorrectly," Professor Longbottom said. "Twenty points from Gryffindor, and don't let me have to speak to you again."

"Tell-tale," Lily hissed at Ilonka as Professor Longbottom walked away.

"Big-head," Ilonka hissed back.

Mia grabbed Lily's arm. "Put your wand away – don't rise to her. She just wants to get you into trouble."

"I know," Lily huffed. "You don't have to tell me – I know what she's up to."

Lily worked in a huffy silence for the rest of the double period. Ilonka looked pleased with herself, and kept making snide remarks to Brooke about Lily. After a while, Lily thrust her wand into Mia's hand with a growled,

"Look after it so I don't do anything stupid."

At dinner, Lily was still in a grump. She sat with Mia and Hugo, opposite James, Fred and Chris, and after enduring the boys' good natured teasing for several minutes, she eventually stormed off to the other end of the table, where she sat alone.

"What's got into her?" James asked.

"Ilonka Kallous wound her up in Herbology, so she jinxed her, and got in trouble with Professor Longbottom," Mia explained.

"Figures," James nodded.

"Can't you do anything about your sister, James?" Fred asked, looking down the table to where Lily was growling at a pair of first-year boys who'd dared sit opposite her.

"No," James grinned. "Lily... well, she's just..."

"Lily," Hugo supplied.

After dinner, Lily cornered Luci Hamel in the Entrance Hall.

"Hey, you!" she said, grabbing the small blonde girl by her shoulders.

"Get off me!" Luci said, wriggling to try and get free.

"Lily, stop," Mia said, but Lily ignored her.

"Let go!" Luci said, trying to reach into her pocket for her wand.

"Not until you've listened to me," Lily said, shaking the smaller girl slightly. "You need to stay away from Ilonka Kallous."

"Why?" Luci demanded.

"Because you're a Gryffindor, and she's a Slytherin. And she's a cow!"

"No she's not," Luci said, struggling free of Lily's grip. "You just don't understand her. You don't understand how hard it is for her – and me – coming to school in a different country where all the lessons are in a different language to the one you speak at home, where everyone is of the same nationality, and already has a friendship because of that. Perhaps if you all just accepted her as who she is, she wouldn't spend all her time trying to be who she's not!"

She pushed past Mia and Hugo, and up the marble staircase. Mia watched her go, thinking about what she'd just said. Had they been unfair on Ilonka? Maybe she did find it hard, being at a school where everyone was English and she wasn't, but surely that didn't give her the right to be horrible to other people.

No, Mia thought, maybe they hadn't been unfair on Ilonka, but what about Luci? She'd been thrown into a school worlds apart from her own, in classes with kids who were older than her and had made friends with each other already. No wonder she wasn't exactly the friendliest of people. Perhaps she ought to try harder to be friends with Luci from now on.


	18. Chapter Eighteen: the Lion and the Eagle

Chapter Eighteen

The Lion and The Eagle

Over the next week or so, Mia made a concentrated effort to be more friendly towards Luci, despite Lily repeatedly telling her not to bother. She was rewarded by Luci becoming more friendly towards her, talking to her more, and even once joining in with a game of exploding snap in the house common room.

The morning of the Gryffindor-Ravenclaw game dawned cool and clear. Mia managed a light breakfast with her friends, before heading down to the pitch with the rest of the team.

"Excellent conditions," Danielle said in the changing rooms. "Couldn't've asked for better, really. Now look, guys, I know recently I've been a bit of a..."

"Cow?" Fred suggested.

"Slave driver?" James offered.

"Pain the backside," Samuel grinned.

"Yeah, all of the above," Danielle conceded. "But this is what it was for – we're going to wipe the floor with Ravenclaw."

"We'll thrash them, Dan," James agreed.

The team filed out onto the pitch, where Mac introduced them:

"The Gryffindor team: Wood, Potter, Weasley, Cattermole, Weasley, Dursley aaaaand Wood!"

Mia looked up into the stands as they waited for the Ravenclaw team to arrive. She could just make out Lily and Hugo, sat with Rachel Wilson and the Longbottom twins, right at the top of the stands. Over at the Ravenclaw end, Louis was wearing another huge hat that Lily's godmother had lent him – this one topped with a Ravenclaw eagle.

"And here come the Ravenclaws!" Mac shouted into the magical megaphone. "Goldstein, Senior, Boot, Weasley, Leigh, Smith aaaaand Toft!"

There were cheers from the Ravenclaw stands as the two teams faced each other. Mia stood and faced her opposite number, a large sixth year boy, and smiled back when Louis' sister Dominique, who was one of the Ravenclaw beaters, smiled at her. Samuel and Matt Toft seemed to be trying to out-stare each other, until the Ravenclaw boy stepped forward to shake Danielle's hand on Madam Hooch's command.

Mia mounted her broom and kicked off on the whistle, heading for the goal hoops with Mac's commentary ringing in her ears.

"And they're off! Ravenclaw are in possession – Goldstein passes to Boot, to Senior, back to Goldstein. These three learnt to fly together as first years, so they're very tight as a team."

"Shame they're all equally rubbish," Roxanne grinned, flying towards Mia to deflect a bludger, and sending it straight at Krystelle Goldstein. She dived to avoid it, but also dropped the Quaffle, which was snatched up by Fred, who'd been flying beneath the Ravenclaw chasers, waiting for such an opportunity.

"And it's Gryffindor's Fred Weasley in possession, he passes to Wood, back to Weasley, to Potter, and it's Gryffindor's James Potter heading for goal."

"Come on, James!" Mia yelled, and she watched as the Ravenclaw keeper dived completely the wrong way, and James scored.

Gryffindor were four goals up before Mia had to do anything other than watch. The three Ravenclaw chasers did work well together, but James and Fred had been playing together since they were toddlers, and Danielle was a formidable player, tearing up the pitch and covering more ground than James and Fred put together.

"And it's Fred Weasley in possession, he passes to Potter, and it's – oooh, nice bludger there from his cousin, Ravenclaw's Dom Weasley, Potter drops the Quaffle, and it's snatched up by Goldstein – look at her go!"

Krystelle Goldstein was tearing up the pitch towards Mia, her fellow chasers not far behind. Mary sent a bludger at Goldstein, and she passed to Senior, who flew towards Mia's left hand hoop, as Roxanne tore after the second bludger to hit at him. The Ravenclaw player was just outside the scoring area when Mia heard the dull thud of bat on bludger, and looked down to see the bludger soaring up through the air towards Senior. He saw it too, but the other Ravenclaw chasers were too far away to be of any help to him. Instead, he decided to try and score from where he was, and so Mia had plenty of time to put herself between the Quaffle and the hoop. Hugging the Quaffle to her chest, she moved back in front of the centre hoop so she was covering all three, and then passed the Quaffle back to Danielle, who was waiting for it.

As the match wore on, Gryffindor pulled further ahead, as Samuel and Matt Toft both circled high above, looking for the elusive snitch. When Gryffindor were leading 90-0, Mac suddenly got everyone's attention by shouting, "Is that the snitch?!"

Everyone, Mia included, looked to where he was pointing. Toft was diving towards the ground, Samuel in hot pursuit. Mia watched as the two boys flew nearer and nearer the ground, Samuel now only a broom's length behind the older boy. At the last minute, Toft pulled out of the dive. Samuel, realising the Ravenclaw seeker had been feinting, and hadn't even seen the snitch, pulled out of the dive too, only a fraction of a second before he would have hit the ground.

"RAVENCLAW SCORE!" Mac shouted. "Ten points to Ravenclaw – Gryffindor lead 90-10."  
"What?" Mia looked around, to seem Amy Boot hovering near the right hand hoop, and the Quaffle falling away to the ground behind the goal hoops. Mia could've kicked herself. She'd been too busy watching the snitch that she hadn't even noticed the Ravenclaw chaser scoring. She flew down to retrieve the Quaffle and passed it back to Danielle, expecting a rebuke, but Danielle just flew off, a look of grim determination on her face. Mia could make an educated guess at what she was thinking – they had to get 150 points ahead, because if that had been the snitch rather than Toft just feigning, they would have lost by now.

The match lengthened, and Mia felt she redeemed herself somewhat by blocking three more attempts on goal by Ravenclaw. Gryffindor were now leading 150 points to 10 – just one more goal and then there was no danger of Ravenclaw winning - if Toft caught the snitch the game would end in a draw instead. Mia wondered vaguely what happened if two teams drew; she'd never heard of it happening before.

"And it's Gryffindor's James Potter in possession, he dodges a bludger from Weasley, and passes to other Weasley – Fred, that is – who in turn passes to Wood, to Potter, back to Wood, to Weasley, and it's Gryffindor's Fred Weasley heading for goal, he dodges around keeper Smith, HE SCORES! Gryffindor lead, 160 points to 10."

Mia could sense that both teams were starting to tire now, after nearly two hours of intense play. Samuel needed to catch the snitch soon, before he was too tired too.

Right on cue, Mia spotted the two seekers diving for the snitch, which was circling near the foot of the Ravenclaw stands. She forced herself to let Mac's commentary inform her on what was going on, and instead concentrated on the three Ravenclaw chasers, who were flying towards her in formation, the Quaffle tucked under Krystelle Goldstein's arm.

"Toft's gaining on the snitch, but it doesn't look like he's trying to catch the snitch, just block Wood..." Mac commentated. "Interesting... if Ravenclaw gets just ten more points, then Toft catching the snitch would mean a win... C'MON RAVENCLAW!"

Mia was slightly taken aback at Mac's blatant bias towards Ravenclaw – he was usually pretty good at remaining impartial, and he wasn't even in Ravenclaw. But then Ravenclaw winning would give Hufflepuff a better chance in the house cup, and he was dating Dove Ackerley.

Mia steeled herself as the Ravenclaw chasers drew nearer. Roxanne and Mary were too busy trying to send bludgers at Toft to help her, and she had to stop Ravenclaw scoring, because it could be the difference between a win and a loss. Mac's commentary told her Toft was still just blocking Samuel rather than catching the snitch.

Goldstein passed the Quaffle to Boot, who passed it to Senior, who was coming up on Mia's left. He made as if to shoot, and Mia dived left but at the last minute Senior passed to Goldstein, who easily put the Quaffle through Mia's right hand hoop.

"RAVENCLAW SCORE!" Mac shouted excitedly. "Gryffindor lead, 160 points to 20."

Every eye in the stadium was now on the two seekers. Gryffindor were now only 140 points ahead, which meant that whoever caught the snitch now would secure a win for their house. Toft was inches from the snitch when a bludger hit him, knocking him off course and allowing Samuel to fly the last few feet to the snitch. As his fingers closed around the tiny gold ball, a huge cheer went up from the red and gold supporters, and Mac shouted into the magical megaphone:

"GRYFFIDNOR WIN! Wood catches the snitch, earning Gryffindor 150 points. Final score: 310 to 20."


	19. Chapter Nineteen: Parents, Potions and

Chapter Nineteen

Parents, Potions and Precarious Friendships

After the excitement of the Quidditch match, Mia was happy to settle down to the relatively quiet pace of normal Hogwarts life with her friends. Although teachers were still piling the pressure on in class, and they seemed to have more homework than ever, the gang still found time to just hang out in the Inter-House Common Room.

"So," Mac said on one such evening towards the end of March, as he perched on a table overlooking a group of second years. Mac and Dove had broken up in the aftermath of the Quidditch match when Dove complained Mac had been too happy about Gryffindor winning, and Mac had sulked about it for several days, before bouncing back into his usual, cheerful self. "I'm bored," he said now, looking around at the dozen or so second years sat around in a circle.

"Do some homework?" Hugo suggested with a yawn.

"My mum says only boring people get bored," piped up Ailie Abercrombie, Alexander's little sister, who'd taken to hanging around with the gang recently.

Mac poked his tongue out at her, and Kieran said,

"Yeah, but your mum's a _weather reporter_," in a voice which suggested being a weather reporter was not something one should aspire to.

"What even _is_ a weather reporter?" Zoe asked.

"Someone who pretends they know what the weather's going to be like tomorrow," Rachel grinned.

"So it's a bit like Divination?" Frankie asked.

Rachel nodded. "Only more widely accepted."

Mia, sat between Lily and Cassie, wasn't entirely sure comparing meteorology to divination was a particularly good comparison, but she couldn't be bothered to get into a debate on the matter.

"What does everyone's parents do?" Mac asked, looking around the group. "My dad's a muggle, and he teaches – Science."

"What's Science?" Alice Longbottom wanted to know.

"Kinda like magic, without the magic," Mac shrugged.

"How does that work?" Louis demanded. He and Mac had often clashed heads in the past eighteen months, as they had quite similar dominant personalities, but they'd found some sort of solidarity in the past two weeks, and Mac joked about making them badges: I dated Dove Ackerley.

"It doesn't. They're muggles," Mac grinned. "Anyway, my mum's a witch, and she works for the Ministry – Magical Law Enforcement."

"My parents both work for Gringotts," Louis said, elbowing Mac to make him move over and give him more room on the table. "Mum only works part time now, though. Dad used to work in Egypt, but he's based in England now... although he sometimes goes over there when we're all away at school."

"Everyone knows that our parents do," Alice Longbottom said. "Dad's Herbology Professor here, and Mum's landlady of the Leaky Cauldron."

"It must be cool living above a pub," Mac said.

"It's interesting," Frankie nodded. "You get all sorts passing through."

"What about you, Rachel?" Mac asked. "Your parents are both muggles, aren't they?"

Rachel nodded. "My dad's a window cleaner-"

"What's that?" Louis asked.

"Someone who cleans windows, duh," Mac said, shoving him off the table.

Louis landed on the floor with an indignant squawk, and then tipped up the table so that Mac slid off the other side. The two for them picked themselves up off of the floor, and then resumed fighting for the ownership of the table.

"Boys," Lily sighed, to Mia's left, whilst to her right, Cassie seemed to be ignoring the squabble, instead checking her watch.

"Anyway, yeah, my dad's a window cleaner, and my mum's an artist," Rachel said.

"My dad's an auror," Hugo grinned. "And my mum works in Magical Law Enforcement, like your mum, Mac."

"My dad's Head of the Auror office," Lily said. "And my mum's Quidditch correspondent for the _Daily Prophet_."

"My dad owns a drill firm – making and selling drills," Mia said. "And my mum works for him... sometimes."

"What's a drill?" Kieran asked.

Several people offered explanations at once, but Mia wasn't sure Kieran ended up with a particularly clear picture of why muggles wanted to make holes in things when they used drills.

"Cassie – hey, where did Cassie go?" Mac said. Mia looked around; Cassie was no longer on her other side.

"She had to go do some homework," Zoe explained. "My dad's a broom manufacturer..."

In Potions in the last week of term before the Easter Holidays, Lily and Luci got into an argument. They were brewing a simple pain-relieving draught, and as Luci added more ingredients to her cauldron, some of her potion splashed her robes with a pink solution.

"Watch it, idiot," Lily snapped. Her own potion wasn't going too well – it was a resolute orange instead of the pale pink the book described as an ideal halfway stage.

"It was an accident," Luci snapped back. "I hardly splashed you on purpose."

"If something's an accident, you generally say sorry," Lily said hotly.

"You didn't give me a chance to say sorry," Lily said. "You just assumed I did it on purpose, because you always assume the worst of people – me, Ilonka, everybody."

"You and Ilonka aren't everybody," Lily pointed out unhelpfully.

"No, to you we're nobody," Luci said. "Just because we're not in your own group of friends, it doesn't mean you can treat us like dirt."

"You were the one who splashed your potion all over me!" Lily said indignantly. "Stop trying to turn it all round on me."

They all went back to work after that, Cassie shyly offering Lily help with her potion and being snapped at, but Mia thought that Luci had a point, and she told Lily as much as they made their way up to lunch.

"You know, you could be a bit nicer to Luci," she told her. "She does have a point – just because she's not your friend particularly, doesn't give you the right to be horrible to her."

"_Me _horrible to _her_?" Lily huffed. "She's the one who splashed her potion all over me!"

"Which was an accident," Hugo put in.

"Well, I don't think it was," Lily maintained.

"Well, even if it wasn't, that still doesn't give you the right to treat her like dirt," Mia said. "It's not that hard to just be nice to people, Lily."

"It is if they're not nice to you," Lily said.

"Maybe if you were nice to her, she'd be nice back?" Mia suggested.

"I doubt it," Lily grumped.

"Well, isn't it worth a try?" Mia asked. "I have, and it works."

"Well, we can't all be perfect like you, Mia!" Lily retorted angrily.

"I wasn't saying that, only-" Mia began, but Lily cut her off.

"I know what you were saying!" she said. "You think I'm a cow – everyone does. Well I don't care what you think – I don't like Luci and I won't pretend to. And if you're going to be friends with her, then maybe I don't want to be friends with you!"  
With that, Lily stormed off into the Great Hall, squashing herself inbetween the Longbottom twins at the Gryffindor table.

Mia turned to Hugo. "D'you think I should've said that?" she asked him tentatively, expecting Hugo, as Lily's cousin, to side with her.

Hugo hesitated slightly. "Yes," he said eventually. "She needed to hear it... doesn't mean she wanted to. Give her time – she'll come round."

Mia followed Hugo into the Great Hall, and the two of them sat down opposite James, Fred and Chris.

"Where's Lily?" James asked.

"Sulking," Hugo said shortly.

"Ahh," James nodded understandingly. "Whatever it is, she'll come round."

"I hope so," Mia sighed.

"You two had a falling out?" Chris asked.

"Yeah," Mia said. "D'you think I should go talk-"

"No," Hugo said. "Leave her – you know Lily; she likes to cool off by herself, in her own time. She'll make it up with you when she's ready."

Three days later, and Lily still wasn't talking to Mia. Hugo was finding it awkward to be a go-between for the two of them, and remarked that he now knew how Al felt when Rose and Scorp were arguing.

After Herbology on Thursday morning, Professor Longbottom asked Mia to stay behind.

"Is everything alright between you and Lily?" he asked.

"We had a bit of an argument," Mia told him. "She's not talking to me, because I won't stop being friendly towards Luci."

"I was going to mention how well you've been doing with Luci," Professor Longbottom said. "She can't have found it easy settling in, so thank you."

"I haven't always been as friendly as I could've," Mia mumbled, shamefaced. For several months, when Luci was friends with Ilonka, she'd all but ignored the Swiss girl.

"But you've been trying," Professor Longbottom said. "Especially the last few weeks. It hasn't gone unnoticed."  
"No," Mia sighed. "Lily certainly noticed."

"You know, a very wise man once taught me a thing or two about bravery," Professor Longbottom told Mia. "He said that it takes a great deal of courage to stand up to your enemies, but even more to stand up to your friends. I've known Lily since she was little, Mia. She's stubborn and hot-headed, and she just needs a little time. She'll come round."

Mia sincerely hoped so.


	20. Chapter Twenty: The Friend and the Thief

Chapter Twenty

The Friend and the Thief

That night, Mia sat with James, Fred and Chris, shovelling down a hasty dinner before heading off to Quidditch practice. Danielle had originally given in to protests from the team, saying that it was the penultimate day of term and they could afford the night off, and then sent out MIs that morning, saying that holidays or no holidays, it was still only six weeks to the Hufflepuff game, on the first Saturday in May.

"I dunno why I didn't get a MI again," James mused. He'd only just found out about the practice from Fred, and had had to tell Danielle he couldn't make it, as it was Chlo's birthday, and he'd already agreed to spend the evening with her. ("I hear the Room of Requirement's good for snogging," Fred had grinned. "Not that you'd know, since you still haven't asked Ruthie out," James had retorted.)

"Maybe Danielle can't spell your name?" Fred suggested with a grin. "Or maybe she just forgot you – it must be hard for her to remember who she has and hasn't sent one to and you're not exactly important, are you?"

James punched him playfully. "Idiot." He turned to Mia. "Is Lily talking to you yet?" he asked.

"No," Mia sighed.

"Well, if she hasn't seen sense by the time we do go home, I'll talk to her over the holidays," James said.

"Thanks," Mia said.

When they'd all finished eating, James went to extract Chlo from further up the table, where she was sitting with her friends, and Fred and Mia headed off to Quidditch practice, leaving Chris sitting alone.

Danielle was unrelenting during practice, but at least she'd stopped yelling at people for making mistakes. With James absent, she and Fred had to work harder to cover the whole pitch, and Danielle worked harder than anyone.

"You're too hard on yourself, Dan," Samuel told his sister as the team headed back up to the castle after two hours of hard work. "Winning the Cup isn't the be all and end all... I mean, I know we want to, but you do have your NEWTs soon."

"I know," Danielle told him. "But we're going to win – we've got a damn good team, and the only reason we didn't win last year is because James and Fred were idiots and got themselves detention for the day of the match."

Everyone grinned in spite of themselves. The story of how James and Fred had put nifflers into Professor Duncan's office was fast becoming a Hogwarts legend, and despite the fact that it had cost them the Quidditch cup, James and Fred couldn't help feeling quite proud of themselves.

Up in the Gryffindor Common Room, Lily and Hugo were sat at a table in a corner. Mia went over to join them, but as soon as Lily saw her coming, she got up and went to sit with Rachel and the Longbottom twins.

"Has Lily said anything about me?" Mia asked, sitting down opposite Hugo in the newly vacated chair.

"No," Hugo sighed. "Every time I mention your name she changes the subject."

"D'you think I should say I won't be friends with Luci anymore?" Mia asked.

"No," Hugo said. "Lily's in the wrong."

"You and I know that, but you know Lily will never admit she was wrong," Mia said.

"Yeah, cuz she's a stubborn cow," Hugo scowled. "She's my cousin, and I love her, but she is a stubborn cow sometimes."

Mia was saved from having to agree or disgrace with him by a disturbance on the other side of the common room. James had Josh Young up against the wall and was pointing his wand at his throat.

"Admit it!" he shouted. "You've been stealing my MIs!"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Josh spat. "Now let go of me, and point your wand somewhere else!"

"You 'don't know what I'm talking about?'" James scoffed. "You're holding a MI I just sent in your hand! And you're the reason I haven't been getting MIs from Danielle about Quidditch practice, aren't you?"

"Well done, pea brain," Josh said boredly. "Took you long enough to figure out they weren't just disappearing. Yeah, I got you in trouble with Wood over Quidditch, and with your girlfriend at Halloween. I tried to get at you through your little sister, but that didn't work out – you seemed _pleased_ when she got detention."

"You stole that MI I sent to Louis?!" Lily said, rushing over and taking her wand out.

"Go away, Lily," James growled. "This is nothing to do with you."

"Like hell it's not!" Lily said indignantly. "It's his fault we all got detention – he told on us to Professor Duncan!"

"Go away!" James repeated. "This is between me and him." He turned back to Josh. "Why?" he asked him.

"Because you're an arrogant, privileged _git_ who needs taking down a peg or two," Josh scowled. "James 'unstoppable' Potter, who always gets what he wants, and to hell with everyone else!"

James laughed, releasing the younger boy. "You're pathetic," he said. "You did all this because you think I need taking down a peg or two? I know I'm not perfect, and I don't just get everything handed to me on a silver platter. I have to work damn hard to get what I want, just like everyone else. In fact, the only person who seems to think I'm any different to everyone else is you, Josh. If I didn't know better, I'd say you were jealous... either that or you have a crush on me!"

With that, James turned and walked away.

"Aren't you going to hex him or something?" Lily asked, incredulous.

James shook his head. "I'm not gonna stoop of his level." Everyone in the Common Room was still watching, so he said, "Alright, folks, show's over – go back to your pretending to study."

Lily made as if to come over to the table where Mia and Hugo were sitting to discuss what'd just happened, and for a fleeting second Mia thought things would just go back to normal, but then she turned and went to sit with Roxanne and Lottie.

On the train on the way back home for the Easter holidays, the gang all shared a compartment, but Lily sat at the other end from Mia, with Alice, Frankie and Rachel. Hugo tried to teach Mia wizard's chess, but Mia had never been much good at planning ahead, and it was difficult to concentrate when Louis and Zoe were sat opposite them, giggling and holding hands. After weeks of flirting, Louis had finally asked Zoe out at breakfast, and they were planning on meeting up in the Easter holidays.

When the train pulled into Kings Cross, late in the afternoon, Mia was glad to go home with her parents. Maybe the two weeks of Easter holiday would be the time apart she and Lily had needed to be friends again. The past week had made her realise that Lily really was her best friend. The rest of the gang were all good friends, but they could never replace Lily.

It didn't take Mia's parents long to realise that something was up. Before they'd even got home, they'd already asked her if she was alright three times.

"Lily and I had a falling out," Mia explained sleepily. She couldn't wait to get home and sleep in her own bed.

Over the holidays, Mia met up with some of her friends from Primary School, which just reinforced how much she missed Lily. She'd used to be really good friends with these girls, but they'd drifted apart in the past two years as their lives became vastly different. Whilst her old friends were still learning Maths and English and History and Geography, Mia had spent her time learning spells and brewing potions. She couldn't talk about her lessons – in the Muggle world, only her parents knew she was a witch – but she told her old friends all about the gang, and tried to get advice on the Lily problem. The suggestions varied, but none of them were particularly helpful, and when her friends left, Mia didn't think that she was any closer to figuring out a way to get Lily to be friends with her again without backing down on her stance on Luci.

Eventually, Mia decided to write to Will about it, as well as asking if he had any tips for playing against Hufflepuff. As she had expected his response re Lily wasn't particularly helpful, concluding that Mia new Lily a lot better than Will did, and he was sure she'd figure something out. He did, however, give her some good pointers about the Hufflepuff chasers, so at least she went back to school feeling more comfortable about the upcoming Quidditch match.

Mia's dad had to work on the day she went back to Hogwarts, so she and her mum caught the train up to London. Navigating Muggle public transport with a trunk and an owl wasn't the easiest of tasks, but the two of them managed it, and then Mia was left to get onto Platform 9¾ by herself, so her mum didn't miss her connecting train.

Even though she was used to getting on the platform, Mia still enjoyed walking through the solid wall between platforms nine and ten. It was the first time she'd ever really felt confirmation that she was a witch; only magical people could get through the barrier, and she had to hold her parents hands to let them through.

Mia took the barrier at a brisk walk, trying not to draw attention to herself. As the barrier drew nearer, she had a fleeting moment of panic that she was going to crash into the wall, and then she was through, on Platform 9¾, where the gleaming red Hogwarts Express was waiting.

"Mia!" she heard Lily shriek, before she was engulfed in a mass of arms and red hair. "I'm sorry I stopped being your friend," Lily said. "I was an idiot, and I missed you and I'm sorry."

Mia smiled as Lily released her. "It's alright," she said. "So are we friends again?"

Lily nodded. "My mum says it's none of my business who you're friends with and she's right. I'm sorry I tried to tell you you couldn't be friends with Luci... and maybe she's not all that bad... c'mon, let's go get a compartment!"

Mia let her friends grab her hand and lead the way onto the train.


	21. Chapter Twenty-One: Choices

Chapter Twenty One

Choices

The train ride back to school was a lot more fun for Mia than the one home had been. With Lily her friend again, the two of them played exploding snap with Hugo and Cassie, to a backdrop of Lily and Hugo recounting their holidays. Lily was going to be a bridesmaid at Teddy and Vic's wedding in the summer, and she spent twenty minutes describing the dress she was going to wear, oblivious to the fact that no one cared.

After dinner that night, most people headed straight to bed, but in the Gryffindor common room, James, Fred and Chris were doing a roaring trade in a new batch of MIs.

"Roll up, roll up!" James was shouting. "Come and get your new and improved MIs – now with an added stinging hex to keep your private messages private!"

"How does that work?" a fourth year demanded. "Won't everyone just get stung?"

"Everyone except the intended recipient," James explained. "Once you send it, anyone who tries to open it – apart from whoever it's addressed to – will get stung." He glared meaningfully at Josh Young, who shoved past him on his way up to the dormitories. Mia thought she could probably tell where this new 'improvement' to MIs had come from.

The first lesson for the Gryffindor second years on Monday morning was double Transfiguration, a fact that Lily was quick to bemoan at breakfast.

"Whose idea was it to start our week with a double dose of Duncan?" she grumbled at her cereal.

"Some git's," Hugo shrugged, looking up at the staff table, where Professor Duncan was talking to Professor Nilsson. "Although, knowing you, you'd probably complain whatever we had first – it's too much like hard work, or it's too far away, or you have to go outside..."

Lily thumped him, and they all laughed. As they were finishing eating, Professor Longbottom started walking up and down the table, handing out forms to all the second years.

"Option forms, for your third year subjects," he told them. "To be handed in to me by the end the month."

Mia looked down at her form, and read:

'THIRD YEAR OPTIONS: All third years are required to take on two or three additional subjects. You will have undertaken taster sessions in all subjects and should be able to make an informed choice (if you need further guidance, please speak to your subject teachers and/or Head of House). Students who choose to take two subjects will have three supervised study periods a week. Please indicate whether you wish to take two or three subjects, and mark your top three (if taking two subjects) or four (if taking three subjects) preferences, in order. (In the case of timetabling difficulties leading to an inability to allocate you your first choice of subjects we will endeavour to notify you).'

Below this, there were tick boxes next to 'I wish to study three subjects' and 'I wish to study two subjects (and have three supervised study periods)', and space to write numbers to indicate their preference next to the subjects 'Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, Care of Magical Creatures, Divination, Muggle Studies and Wizarding Social Studies'.

"What are you taking, Mia?" Lily asked, as they headed up to Transfiguration.

Mia hadn't quite decided yet. "Care of Magical Creatures," she said. "And then I think Social Studies... and maybe Arithmancy or Ancient Runes... I haven't really decided."

"I'm taking Care of Magical Creatures and Muggle Studies," Lily said.

"Why only two?" Hugo asked. "You don't really want supervised study periods, do you?"

"Yeah, I do, cuz it'll actually make me do some work," Lily grinned. "And I'm not going to have as much time next year, cuz hopefully I'll get onto the Quidditch team. Have you decided what you're taking, Hugo?"

Hugo nodded. "Care of Magical Creatures, Muggle Studies and Social Studies," he said. "Although sometimes I think third year subject are just a distraction – a fun distraction, but I'd rather stick with the basics."

"I like them..." Lily pouted.

"Yeah, but you like them because they're fun," Hugo reasoned. "Is anything you do when you're grown up actually going to have anything to do with Care of Magical Creatures or Muggle Studies?"

"Probably not," Lily conceded. "But who cares about being grown up right now – I'm only twelve."

They found Louis waiting for them outside the Transfiguration classroom.

"Have you decided what options you're gonna take?" Lily asked him, as Professor Duncan opened the classroom door.

"Come inside, and put your options forms away," he said. "Anyone I hear as much as mentioning third year subjects in my class will be in detention – you can debate the merits of Divination vs Arithmancy in your own time."

That put an end to all the discussion, and the Gryffindors and Ravenclaws filed into the classroom in silence, although Lily was muttering under her breath that Professor Duncan was mean.

After Transfiguration, they had History of Magic, which was a lot easier to carry on a conversation in. Louis told them that he was definitely taking Arithmancy and Ancient Runes, and he was still undecided between Muggle Studies and Care of Magical Creatures for his third option. Lily couldn't understand why everyone else was taking three options, and everyone else couldn't understand why she was only taking two subjects.

Whilst the second years puzzled over their third-year options forms, in the meantime, they had exams to be revising for. There were no exams for their third-year subjects, as they were only taster sessions, but even so, they still had plenty of other subjects to study.

Danielle had reverted to three Quidditch practices a week, and she was becoming almost unbearably crabby, as she revised for her NEWTs and trained at Quidditch harder than ever, until James told her he was going to take one practice a week, and she wasn't allowed to come. Then the team got a glimpse of what kind of Quidditch captain James would make, if he was chosen next year (and Mia expected he would be, since he was more of a leader than Fred, and, if Mia was being honest, probably the better player); he worked the team very hard, but was also up for a little fun, providing the work got done. And he was extremely fond of drills.

Whilst Danielle's style was to talk about where the team's weaknesses lay and then address them in a game set-up, James preferred to address weaknesses in drills. He made the whole team participate in passing drills with the Quaffle, because he said they all needed excellent reflexes and coordination, and then sent Roxanne and Mary off to practice their aim by hitting bludgers at each other, whilst he and Fred worked on their manoeuvres and tried to put goals past Mia.

"Don't worry, Mia!" Fred called, as he and James managed to score yet another goal. "Hufflepuff won't be anywhere near as good as we are."

Mia grinned, knowing most of what he was saying was general good natured banter – Hufflepuff _were_ a good team.

"Alright, guys," James called. "Gather round – Roxy, Mary!"

Roxanne and Mary flew over to the goal hoops. Samuel, in pursuit of the snitch, didn't hear.

"Hey, let's have some fun," James grinned. "Let's see if we can work together and block Sam and get the snitch before he does."

"What's the point in that?" Roxanne asked.

James shrugged. "It's fun, and it'll give Samuel a run for his money."

The team spent fifteen minutes attempting to stop Samuel getting the snitch, but he eventually caught it.

"You guys are idiots!" he said, landing on the ground, panting for breath. The rest of the team landed beside him, grinning and giggling.

"Well, you've proved you can take on a whole team of idiots, so you should have no problem with taking on Cadwallder," James grinned.

As the end of April approached, the second years had to hand in their options forms. In the Inter-House Common Room the night before they were due in, everyone was debating the merits of one subject vs. another, and those who'd already picked their subjects trying to persuade their friends to take the same as them.

Mia was still trying to decide between Ancient Runes and Arithmancy, and Louis, who was taking both, sat down to help her weigh up the pros and cons.

"Arithmancy's probably harder," he reasoned, "but then I guess it can be more widely applied too – there aren't many jobs where you can use Runes."  
"You could always not do either, and have study periods with me," Lily suggested.

"Or pick something really random, like Divination," Hugo grinned.

Mia pulled a face. "I _don't_ think so."

"Well, what's it going to be?" Louis asked, waving the form in her face. "Arithmancy or Runes?"

"Runes," Mia said eventually. "There's too many numbers in Arithmancy."

Louis laughed. "Well it is about the magical properties of numbers..." he said.

Mia took the form from Louis and filled it in. "There," she said. "Done. Now we just have to remember to give them in to Professor Longbottom in Herbology tomorrow."

"Why aren't you at Quidditch practice?" Lily asked Mia, suddenly realising it was Thursday evening, which was the usual day for Gryffindor Quidditch practice.

"Danielle had a study group, so we're gonna have one last practice tomorrow night," Mia explained.

"Nervous?" Hugo asked. The Gryffindor vs. Hufflepuff game on Saturday would decide the Quidditch cup, and the whole school was gearing up for the game.

"Some," Mia nodded. "But I think we're ready – there's not much more we can do..."

"You're going to win," Lily said confidently. "Danielle'll kill you if you don't."

"Mmm," Mia agreed. "But then I guess it is her last chance to win the cup, so... If I were in her position, I'd probably be the same..."

"You're supporting Gryffindor, aren't you, Louis?" Lily asked.

"I guess so..." Louis said. "Privately, maybe. But I'm sitting with Zoe, so..."

"So you have to support your girlfriend's team, of she'll ditch you, like Dove did Mac," Hugo grinned.

"Precisely," Louis said.


	22. Chapter Twenty-Two: The Quidditch Cup

Chapter Twenty-Two

The Quidditch Cup

Saturday, match day, dawned clear and bright. Danielle discussed the conditions as the team walked down to the pitch after breakfast.

"Watch the wind, everyone," she said. "It'll blow the balls – particularly the Quaffle – off course. Mia, you better be particularly careful you don't get caught out... or get blown off course yourself."

"Aww, squirt," James said, ruffling Mia's hair.

"Go away," she said, glaring at him.

The seven of them made their way into the changing rooms and pulled on their Quidditch robes. Danielle seemed to be done with the pep talk – before they headed out onto the pitch, she only managed to say, "You know what we've got to do – win."

The Hufflepuff team were already on the pitch, and Mac was giving his usual pre-match commentary, with a heavy bias towards Hufflepuff, his own team. The whole school and the entirety of the staff had turned out for the game, with the Ravenclaws and the Slytherins all taking sides, mainly based upon what house their boyfriend or girlfriend was in. Mia could see Scorp helping Rose wave a Gryffindor banner up in the stands, and Louis was over the other side of the pitch, cheering for Hufflepuff with Zoe.

Danielle shook hands with the Hufflepuff captain, and then they were off. Mia headed for the goal hoops, listening to Mac's commentary.

"And they're off!" he said, shouting into the magical megaphone. "Hufflepuff in possession – Shane Hailey to be precise. Top lad, Hailey – always lets me copy his Herbology homework if I haven't done it... kidding Professor," he grinned at Professor Longbottom, who was also sat in the commentator's podium, supervising him. "Aaaanyway – Lovell's in possession now – extremely good looking, but she won't go out with me-" Professor Longbottom moved towards Mac as if to confiscate the megaphone, and so Mac hastily turned his attention back to the game "-alright, Professor, I'll get on with the commentary – Gryffindor captain Danielle Wood in possession, she passes to Potter, to Wood, to...ooh, intercepted by Creevey, Hufflepuff in possession now, and it's Coleen Creevey headed for goal."  
Mia got ready, watching the Hufflepuff chaser flying towards her, Quaffle tucked under her arm.

"And Creevey's got a clear field in front of her... only Gryffindor keeper Dursley stands between her and the points... oooh! Nasty bludger there from Weasley, and...yes... Creevy's dropped the Quaffle, and it's snatched up by other Weasley – Fred."

As the Gryffindor chasers tore up the pitch, flying in formation, Mia glanced up to where Samuel and the Hufflepuff seeker, a stringy sixth year boy, were circling, keeping close to each other and keeping watch for the snitch.

"Weasley passes to Potter, back to Weasley, to Wood... oooh, epic bludger there from Hufflepuff newcomer Casey Miles... he all but knocked the Gryffindor captain off her broom!" Mac yelled, clearly biased towards his own team. "And it's Lovell in possession, she passes to Creevey, to Hailey, back to Creevey, Hailey, Lovell-"

Mia had to admit that the Hufflepuff chasers were good, passing the Quaffle so quickly that Mac could only shout their names. The three of them were flying ever closer, Shane Hailey in the middle, the two girls either side. As they entered the scoring area, Lovell passed the Quaffle back to Hailey, and Mia got ready to block the goal.

Hailey aimed for the left hoop, and Mia dived. She wasn't quick enough to catch the Quaffle, but she just managed to hit it out of the way. Alicia Lovell flew down to retrieve the Quaffle as Mac shouted,

"SAVED! by Gryffindor keeper Mia Dursley. And the score still stands at 0-0."

As the match lengthened, it seemed the teams were locked in a kind of stalemate, with the few attempts on goal being thwarted by the Keepers, but most of the time it didn't even get that far – the chasers were constantly intercepting the Quaffle, only to be knocked off course by the opposing team's bludgers before they could get very far. Half an hour passed, and still the game was scoreless.

"And it's Hufflepuff's Coleen Creevey in possession, she passes to Lovell, to Hailey, to Creevey, back to Hailey – could this be the break Hufflepuff need?"

Mia steeled herself. Coleen Creevey was in possession again, flying towards Mia's left hand hoop, with her fellow chasers flying in formation: Lovell in the centre and Hailey on Mia's right. Mia steeled herself for Creevey's attempt on goal... but it never came. At the last minute, the fifth year girl passed the Quaffle to Hailey, behind Mia, and he easily put it through Mia's right hand hoop.

As Mac yelled triumphantly, "HUFFLEPUFF SCORE!", Mia could hear James and Fred complaining that that was their move.

Play resumed, and Hufflepuff's goal seemed to have been a fluke, as another half hour passed before Gryffindor made their first break, a long range goal from James, which had Mac bringing out his favourite word, 'epic', and Mia imagining what Josh would make of it in the common room later.

"So, it's 10 all, and it's Hufflepuff in possession – Alicia Lovell to be precise – and she passes to Creevey, to Hailiey, back to Lovell, intercepted by Wood, so it's now Gryffindor in possession, reversing the direction of play. Wood passes to Potter, to Weasley, back to Potter, oooh!- epic bludger there from Stebbins, Potter drops the Quaffle, and it's snatched up by Hufflepuff's Shane Hailey, and it's Hailey heading for goal!"

Mia watched Hailey tear up the pitch faster than she'd through his broom was capable of; Mia knew he rode an older model Comet which had once belonged to his brother, because she'd heard him bemoan the fact in the Inter-House Common Room on several occasions. But now he was outstripping all the other players, soaring past teammates and opponents alike, and it was just Mia between him and the points.

Hailey freighted one way and the other, trying to make her dive. Mia held her ground, waiting. She knew he'd have to make an attempt on goal soon, or someone would get him with a bludger. Sure enough, Hailey suddenly aimed for the left hand hoop, and Mia dived a split second too late. Her finger tips brushed the Quaffle, but it still went in.

"HUFFLEPUFF SCORE!" Mac yelled into the magical megaphone. "Shane Hailey's goal puts his team in front again: Hufflepuff leads, 20 points to 10."

The game had been going on for over an hour, and only three goals had been scored. If someone didn't catch the snitch soon, Mia could imagine they'd be locked in this stalemate all day, and then it would become a question of stamina. Mia hoped that Gryffindor would have the upper hand in that case – Danielle's lengthy training sessions had prepared them for the long haul.

Danielle called for time out, and Mia sped towards the ground with the rest of team.

"Samuel, you've gotta shake Cadwallder off," Danielle told her brother. "He's tailing you so close you haven't got a chance of catching the snitch."

"Really?" Samuel asked, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Really, Dan? I hadn't noticed."

"This is serious, Sam," Danielle said. "Unless you get that snitch soon, we're going to be playing into the night."

"Way to point out the obvious," Samuel scowled. "I'm the seeker. I catch the snitch. I get it. The snitch hasn't even appeared yet – what do you expect me to do, summon it?"

"That doesn't sound like a bad-" Danielle began, but Samuel cut her off.

"Except snitches are impervious to summoning, and it would be against the rules even if they weren't," he said. "Stop trying to tell me how to do my job, and concentrate on your own. I notice that you three have only scored on goal between you."

"That's one more goal than you've caught snitches," Fred scowled.

"Yeah, one goal between three people!" Samuel retorted angrily.

"Guys, guys," James said, stepping in between the two boys before they started a fight. "Quit arguing. We're a team. We work together. We don't bicker over who's got the most points or let the side down. Let's go out there and win this thing, alright?"

Madam Hooch blew her whistle to resume play, and Mia flew back to the goal hoops, with a new sense of determination. They _were _going to win this – they had to.

"And it's Gryffindor captain Wood in possession," Mia said. "She passes to Potter, to Weasley, back to Potter, to W- ooh! Intercepted by Creevey, she passes to Lovell, back to Creevey, Lovell, Hailey, Creevey-"

The three Hufflepuff chasers were flying towards Mia, the Quaffle tucked under Coleen Creevey's arm. Mia could see them forming that same formation they'd used to score earlier – Creevey on her left, Hailey on her right, and Lovell in the middle. Mia preapared herself for Creevey to pass to Hailey, and when she did, she dived to block the right hand hoop, but Hailey passed the Quaffle back to Creevey, who put it through the left hand hoop and scored.

"HUFFLEPUFF SCORE!" Mac yelled. "An epic goal from Coleen Creevey means that Hufflepuff lead, 30 points to 10. So, now it's Gryffindor's James – but wait, the seekers are diving – have they seen the snitch?"

Mia watched Samuel and the Hufflepuff seeker diving, both after the winged gold ball which was hovering near the foot of the opposite goal hoops, and which could win their team not only the match but the Quidditch cup. The two boys were just about level – it was anyone's guess as to who would get there first.

"Wood and Cadwallder are neck and neck in the pursuit of the snitch," Mac commentated. "COME ON HUFFLEPUFF!"

The two boys were still level, their arms outstretched as they got nearer to the snitch. Then Cadwallder stretched too far, overbalanced and fell. Samuel caught the snitch and held it triumphantly aloft, as Cadwallder hit the ground, six feet below.

"Gryffindor win," Mac said unenthusiastically. "Wood catches the snitch and earns his house 150 points. Final score: 160 points to 30."

Despite Mac's distinct lack of enthusiasm, the cheers from the Gryffindor stands were deafening. Along with the rest of the team, Mia flew towards Samuel. The whole team collapsed on him in a cheering, hugging mass. They'd won the Quidditch Cup!

An hour later, and the after party in the Gryffindor common room was in full swing. Chris had run down to the kitchens as soon as the match finished, and got food from the house elves. The Quidditch team were all the centre of attention, sometimes unwelcomely so. A couple of hours into the party, Josh Young elbowed his way into the middle of the knot of people, clapping his hands slowly and rolling his eyes at James.

"Well, well, well," he said. "What an 'epic' goal from our one and only 'unstoppable' James Potter. And it really was 'epic' that our most esteemed, or should I even say 'inspired' chaser managed to score his goal – the only one of the match. It's a good job Samuel caught the Snitch, seeing as the rest of the team were so abysmal-"

"What is it with you?" James demanded, walking over to him. "Why can't you just be happy that we won, and keep your cynicism to yourself?"

"Because you Quidditch people think you're a cut above the rest, but actually you're mediocre at best, and that's on a good day," Josh said, standing his ground in spite of the fact that he was surrounded by a whole group of people who'd side with James over him.

"Oh, and you'd've done a better job, would you?" James demanded.

"Yeah, actually, I would," Josh said. "Because Dursely was bloody awful today, and I-"

James hit him, forgetting about magic momentarily in his anger. "Let me make one thing very clear," he growled, as Josh pinched his bloody nose. "You can say anything you like about me, but you leave my friends out of it. Am I clear?"

"Crystal," Josh spat, pushing his way out of the circle.

James went over to Mia. "Don't listen to him, alright?" he told her. "He's just a sore loser, who tries to make everyone else miserable to stave off his own disappointment about being a friendless idiot."

"I know," Mia nodded, but even so, it took a while for the party to get back to its swing. The party lasted all night and well into the early hours of the morning, until Professor Longbottom showed up in his pyjamas to propose a toast to each team member in turn, then the entirety of Gryffindor House, and then sent them all to bed.


	23. Chapter Twenty-Three: Standing On Your

Chapter Twenty-Three

Standing On Your Head

After their late night, a lot of the Gryffindors were half asleep at breakfast the following morning. If it had been any normal Sunday morning, many people would have slept in and skipped breakfast, but it was the 2nd of May, and the 23rd Anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts.

The Victory Day ceremony was a sombre mix of celebrating the victory which had been won when Lord Voldermort had been defeated, and remembering the lives which had been lost for that cause. Although none of the Hogwarts students had known any of the people who died, many of them had lost relatives in the Battle. As the students took their seats by the lake, Mia could see Fred and Roxanne's dad, George, sat between his wife Angelina and brother Percy. He'd lost his twin brother in the battle, and today the whole Weasley family were mourning their fallen warrior. Several rows back from George were Teddy and Vic. Mia knew that today was bittersweet for the two of them; on the one hand, Victoire had been born on the second Anniversary of the Battle, on the other, Teddy had lost both his parents that day.

The ceremony mainly consisted of speeches; tributes to the fallen and pleas to never let things reach that point again. Afterwards, all the students and guests had lunch at little tables on the lawn in front of the castle. Despite everyone's insistence that Mia _was_ a Weasley, she decided not to intrude on the family's grieving, instead sitting with the entire Wood family, at Danielle's request. Danielle's dad had been Gryffindor keeper during his time at Hogwarts, and he was soon giving Mia tips and advice.

As they ate, Mia looked around, wondering if the dozens of other muggle-borns were having a similar experience to her today – a strange sense of disconnection from the mourning of countless families around them. Mia knew she belonged to both the Wizarding and Muggle worlds, but days like this made her wonder...

She spotted Luci, sat alone at a nearby table which was full of adult witches and wizards Mia didn't recognise. In some ways, Luci was even more alone than Mia today; she didn't even have many friends to choose to sit with. Mia asked Mr and Mrs Wood if they minded if she asked someone else to join them, and then went over to Luci.

"Do you want to come and sit with me?" she asked. "I'm over there with the Woods – you know, Danielle and Samuel from the Quidditch team."

"Quidditch?" Luci wrinkled her nose.

"We don't have to talk about Quidditch," Mia said quickly. "I heard Mrs Wood say they might be going to Switzerland this summer – you could tell them all about it."

"Alright," Luci agreed, picking up her plate and following Mia over to the Wood's table. Mia made the introductions and then swiftly turned the topic of conversation from Hawkshead attacking formations to Switzerland and before long, Luic was providing the Woods with a long list of places to visit in her homeland.

Most people stayed at Hogwarts for the whole day, catching up with old friends, walking around the grounds and conducting their own private memorials. As darkness fell, they congregated by the lake again, for a reading of the names of the dead, accompanied by those who'd loved and lost the fallen sending up multi-coloured sparks from their wands in remembrance.

After the busy weekend of the Quidditch final and Victory Day, Monday brought feverish revision for the end of the year exams. Some people didn't seem bothered, like Louis, who claimed he could do the exams standing on his head, which prompted hilarity at the logistics of writing an essay standing on one's head.

"But is 'standing on your head' really the correct terminology?" Mac mused. "Surely 'standing' means that you're on your feet."

"Yeah, but you don't say 'standing on your feet'," Lily said.

"Exactly," Mac said. "You don't say 'standing on your feet' because just the word 'standing' means 'standing on your feet'."

"Surely 'standing on your head' means like with your feet on your head..." Alexander said.

"Yeah, hey, Alexander, I bet I could do my exams standing on _your_ head," Kieran said, attempting to do just that as his friend ran off across the Inter-House Common Room away from him.

"No, but I reckon I _could_ do my exams standing – oh, okay, then... whilst doing a head stand," Louis said.

"Prove it," Zoe grinned.

"I'm not sure that'd go down too well with the teachers..." Louis said. "Can you imagine walking into Transfiguration and just being like 'hey Professor Duncan, I don't need a desk – can you just shove my exam paper on the floor there?'"

"Well, why don't you just do your homework standing on your head now?" Lily suggested. "Just to prove you can."

"Alright," Louis said, carefully setting out parchment, quill and ink on the floor.

"You're not really gonna do it, are you?" Hugo asked, but Mia knew Louis was; he never backed down from a challenge.

Louis did a headstand, and everyone cheered. Then he lifted a hand to reach for his quill, and promptly fell over, smashing his ink bottle beneath him.

As the exams drew nearer, informal study groups were formed. Everyone wanted to pick Cassie's brains about Potions, and Theo Nott was really good at Charms. Luci's best subject was Herbology, and so one evening towards the end of May, she and Mia were sat together in the Inter-House Common Room, revising.

"I don't get how you remember all this..." Mia sighed, flicking through her copy of _One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi._

"It's not really remembering..." Luci shrugged. "Well, it is... but it's like all your friends – you don't have to make an effort to remember their names or the things that they like or don't like, because they are important to you, so you just remember. It's the same with me and plants."

"Well, I guess that's not going to help me," Mia sighed. "I'll just have to learn them the old fashioned way." She started on another flashcard.

Several minutes later, Lily collapsed in the chair beside Mia. "I need help!" she declared dramatically.

"With what?" Mia asked, glancing up from her notes.

"Herbology," Lily sighed. "I'm getting my knotgrass mixed up with my kneefern, and I can't for the life of me remember what you use shrivlefigs for."

"Luci's good at Herbology," Mia told her pointedly, expecting Lily to brush off the comment and say she'd go and ask someone else.

"Luci..." Lily said tentatively. "I'm sorry if I've been mean to you, and... um... please can you help me with Herbology?"

Mia saw Luci hesitate momentarily. "You're sorry because you want me to help you?" she said eventually.

Lily shook her head. "I'm sorry _and _I'd like you to help me... please?"

Mia fully expected Luci to refuse, but then she smiled, and said, "Alright. What are you stuck on?"

After that, Luci started hanging out with and studying with the gang more often, and the others followed Mia and Lily's lead in being more friendly towards her. Things were, Mia thought, just as they should have been from the start of the year, if only Lily and Luci hadn't got off on the wrong foot.

As May became June, the weather got warmer, until all everyone wanted to do was lounge about in the grounds by the lake doing nothing, but instead they were all inside, in the library or their common room, huddled over books and cramming their heads full of facts and dates and incantations; exams were upon them.


	24. Chapter Twenty-Four: Camping Out

Chapter Twenty-Four

Camping Out

On the first morning of exams, the Great Hall was almost silent at breakfast. All along the house tables, textbooks were propped up against milk jugs, and students were feverishly muttering dates and incantations. Kieran Finnigan managed to set a piece of toast on fire, and Alexander put it out by pouring milk on it, turning the plateful of food into a soggy mess.

The second years' first exam was Charms, and so after breakfast, they headed up to the second floor. In the Charms Corridor, many of their fellow second years were putting in some last minute practice, seriously flouting the no magic in corridors rule.

"I'm going to fail!" Lily said dramatically. "I've forgotten everything!"

"No you're not," Hugo sighed – Lily was always like this around exams.

Louis sauntered over, running his hand through his silvery-blonde hair, Zoe holding his hand. "Alright?" he grinned.

"No," Lily scowled. "Why are you so cheerful?"

"Cuz I'm gonna ace this exam, because I'm just naturally awesome," Louis said, as Zoe giggled. "Oh, and I have an awesome girlfriend," he added, as if only noticing her for the first time. The two of them walked away, and Lily sighed.

"Why do girls turn into giggling idiots around boys?" she asked. "First Dove, now Zoe... and Zoe's not even particularly ditzy, but she sure acts like it around Louis."  
"Maybe it's just Louis and his charm," Hugo grinned, running his hand through his hair, in a very characteristic Louis gesture.

Lily and Mia both laughed, as Professor Flitwick opened the classroom door.

"I've forgotten everything! I'm going to fail!" Lily wailed again.

"No you're not," Hugo told her firmly, as they filed into the classroom.

"No more talking now," squeaked tiny Professor Flitwick, "take your seats, come along now."

Everyone took their seats, in the classroom which had been magically enlarged to accommodate the whole year, instead of just two houses. Matt Toft, the Ravenclaw seeker, was sat at the front of the room, supervising the written portion of the exam, whilst Professor Flitwick called each student into his office in turn, for a two-and-a-half minute practical exam.

The exam wasn't easy, but Mia thought she'd done alright. Lily came out declaring, as usual, that she'd failed, and, as usual, no one believed her. Louis said that he'd aced it, and everyone was inclined to believe him, as he was one of those people who seemed able to get perfect results with very little work.

"Why d'you suppose the castle's not just one corridor, and all the rooms are magically expanded broom cupboards?" Louis asked as the six of them – Lily, Mia, Hugo, Louis, Zoe and Cassie – walked to the Inter-House Common Room to revise for their next exam, Defence Against the Dark Arts.

"Maybe it is, and we don't know," Hugo suggested.

"I think Dad said it takes a lot of magic to have undetectable extension charms on everything," Lily said. "That's why people only do it for short amounts of time, or on objects... like the tents we put in the bedrooms at Grimauld Place for Christmas."

"Can something 'take too much magic'?" Mia wondered aloud. "There's not like a finite amount of magic, is there?"

"No, but I guess you'd need a really powerful undetectable extension charm to make something bigger forever," Zoe said. "Even the charms on tents wear off after a while."

"If only undetectable extension charms were in our exam..." Hugo sighed. "We could've all written about them at length."

"Well, let's forget about Charms now," Lily said. "Defence Against the Dark Arts next."  
The six of them sat down around a table in the Inter-House Common Room, and started testing each other on defensive spells and counter-jinxes. They worked more or less steadily until lunchtime, when they headed down to the Great Hall.

At the Gryffindor table, Lily, Mia and Hugo sat opposite Rose and Albus.

"So, how was your first exam?" Al asked, as they helped themselves to sandwiches.

"Alright," Hugo shrugged. "It seemed okay, but I guess we won't find out until we get the results, will we?"

"I guess not," Al agreed. "So what've you guys got this afternoon?"

"Defence," Lily sighed. "You?"

"Nothing – just revision. Scorp and I are meeting in the Inter-House Common Room," Rose said, confirming Mia's suspicion that she and Scorpius were currently going out – you generally had about a fifty-fifty chance of guessing right with those two.

"You and Scorp still together, then?" Hugo asked, obviously thinking along the same lines as Mia.

"Uh-huh," Rose said. "Yeah, we're good at the moment."

"What she means is it's been three days since their last break up, and they're still in the honeymoon phase," Al translated.

"How many times have they broken up now, Al?" Lily asked.

Al pulled a tatty scrap of parchment out of his pocket, on which he liked to keep count of Rose and Scorp's breakups and makeups, and consulted it. "Ninety two," he announced.

"I wish you wouldn't do that," Rose scowled.

"Then make up your mind about whether you're going to stay with him, or break up for good," Al shrugged. "Until then, I'm going to enjoy keeping count."

The second years' exams were spread out over four days, and so, as they had last year, they finished their exams on Thursday afternoon with Potions. In the Great Hall at lunch on Thursday, Lily went over to talk to Mac at the Hufflepuff table.

"So, are we going to have a barbeque?" she asked him. "Like last year?" This time last year, Mac had organised a barbeque beside the lake, to celebrate the end of the first and second years' exams.

"I'm a third year," Mac reminded her with a scowl. "_My _exams don't finish until next week."

"Oh," Lily said flatly. Then she grinned. "Oh well. See you, loser."

Mac made a rude hand gesture at Lily, as she turned and walked away to the Gryffindor table. Mia and Hugo followed her, laughing.

"So, what are we going to do to celebrate the end of exams?" Lily asked, as they sat down at the Gryffindor table, amongst a ground of fellow second-years.

"Exams haven't even finished yet, Lily," Kieran said. "Why don't we just concentrate on Potions before we worry about what we're going to do afterwards?"

Lily poked her tongue out at him.

"I know what I'd _like_ to do," Alice Longbottom said. "But no one would ever let us."  
"What?" Hugo asked, through a mouthful of food.

"Camp out, like we did at Lily's last summer," Alice said.

"You're right, no one would ever let us," Mia sighed. "They'd say we needed proper supervision."

"Hagrid could supervise us!" Lily said. "We could camp by his hut, and-"

"Yeah, Hagrid'd love that," Hugo grinned. "Supervising a bunch of teenagers all night."

"Well, it'd be worth asking," Lily pouted.

"It wouldn't," Alexander Abercrombie said. "Teachers would just say they're too busy with exams to organise proper supervision."

"Professor Cooke might let us..." Alice mused. "My dad wouldn't, that's for sure."

"Yeah, but why would we ask Professor Cooke when she's not our Head of House?" Hugo asked.

"We could get someone from Hufflepuff to ask," Lily said. "Right after the Potions exams. Maybe Cassie – she's Professor Cooke's star pupil."

Cassie wasn't particularly keen on the idea when Lily broached it on the way down to the dungeons for their Potions exam after lunch.

"Aww, c'mon, Cassie," Louis said – he'd seized on the idea as soon as Lily had told him. "She can only say no. What've you got to lose?"

"Alright," Cassie sighed. "But if she says no, I'm not begging or anything; if she says no, then that's it."

"Okay," Lily nodded, hugging her. "Thank you, Cassie!"

In their Potions exam, they had to brew a simple pain relieving draught – the same Potion Luci had splashed Lily with just before Easter. Before they started, Lily looked over at Luci and grinned. Luci looked puzzled for a minute, and then realised what she was getting at, and grinned back. There were several times when they had to leave their potions brewing – first ten minutes here, then twenty there – and so they spent that time doing the written portion of their exam.

When they'd finished and Professor Cooke had collected their papers and samples of their potions for marking, the gang hung around just outside the door whilst Cassie approached Professor Cooke to ask permission to camp out.

"She's never gonna say yes," Hugo said.

"If she says no we could always sneak out and do it anyway," Lily suggested.

"Yeah, and then celebrate the end of exams with detention," Louis said sarcastically. "Ace idea, Lily."  
Cassie came out of the classroom, shaking her head. "She said no," she relayed. "We'd need several teachers to supervise, and they're all too busy with exams, and marking and stuff. But she did say she'd have a think about how we could celebrate without needing loads of supervision."

Everyone groaned, even those who'd been sure Professor Cooke would say no – it had been nice to hope. They all went outside to the lake, where they were finally able to laze around and do nothing all afternoon, just like they'd been wanting to do for weeks. They were soon joined by Ailie Abercrombie and Olivia Creyer, another Gryffindor first year, who'd just finished their last exam too. Some of the boys started a stone skimming contest, and the others just sat around, chatting or dozing, and made tentative plans to play some Quidditch the following day.

At dinner, Professor Cooke got up to announce that any first or second years who wanted to could camp out in the Inter-House Common Room. It wasn't quite like proper camping, but the gang all agreed it was good enough. Louis proposed three cheers for Professor Cooke, which were carried out noisily, to cynical mutterings by the older students, some of whom weren't even halfway through their own exams yet.

After dinner, the gang made their way up to the Inter-House Common Room, where they found dozens of squashy purple sleeping bags. They were soon joined by about half of the first years, and they spent the evening playing exploding snap and truth or dare, as well as making up silly songs about some of teachers with one of the first years accompanying them on his guitar, and Louis creating an impromptu drum kit from tables, chairs and a stack of textbooks.

Professors Cooke and Reuben came to check on them at ten o'clock, and reminded them that whilst they didn't actually expect them to get much sleep, they were to stay in the Inter-House Common Room now and not go wandering around the corridors. At breakfast the next morning, everyone claimed they hadn't slept a wink, but when Mia had woken up to go to the toilet at 5am, almost everyone had been fast asleep.


	25. Chapter Twenty-Five: Goodbye Luci

Chapter Twenty-Five

Goodbye Luci

After that, the last few weeks of term seemed to fly by. After Friday and the weekend to do as they liked, the second years were back in lessons on Monday, much to Mac's delight; he hadn't liked his friends all being out enjoying themselves whilst he was still hunched over his books in the library.

One morning, in the last week of term, Lily and Mia approached Mac in the courtyard.

"Fancy hosting one of your barbeques again?" Lily asked him.

"I've only ever hosted one barbeque," Mac reminded her. "It's not like I have them all the time."

"We know," Mia said. "But we want to throw a leaving party for Luci, and we thought making it a barbeque would be fun."

"Oh yeah, she's not coming back next year, is she?" Mac said.

Mia shook her head. "She's going back to Switzerland with her family... So, will you host the barbeque?"

"Alright," Mac agreed. "I'll ask Cooky, but I'm sure she'll say yes when I tell her what it's for. So, when do you want this barbeque?"

"Wednesday?" Lily suggested.

"You do realise we're going to have to invite Ilonka and that lot," Hugo said that evening, once permission had been granted, and plans were in full swing.

"Why?" Lily demanded. "Why will we _have_ to?"

"Because they're Luci's friends too," Hugo said. "You can hardly have a leaving party for Luci and not invite all her friends."  
"Yeah, I guess you're right," Mia sighed, not looking forward to having Lily and Ilonka in close proximity for any length of time. "I'll get Ruby to ask them, maybe, cuz I doubt they'll even listen to me."

"And you'll be civil to Ilonka, Lily?" Hugo asked pointedly.

"Only if she's civil to me," Lily scowled.

In Charms the next day, Mia asked Ruby to invite Ilonka and her sheep to Luci's leaving party. Ruby agreed, albeit reluctantly.

"You don't really want Ilonka there, do you?" she asked Mia in an undertone – Luci was sat at the other end of the row, and they were making it a surprise party.

"Not really," Mia agreed, "but she's not Luci's friend, so she ought to be there."

"I guess so..." Ruby said. "Alright, I'll ask them."

On Wednesday, everyone headed down to the lakeside immediately after lessons, apart from Lily and Mia, who'd been tasked with delaying Luci, and then bringing her down to the party once the others had had time to set up. After Charms, Mia stopped to ask Professor Flitwick some questions about her exam paper, and asked Lily and Luci to wait for her. Once she'd finished, they'd given the others almost a ten minute headstart, but they knew that wasn't enough, so as they walked down the stairs, Lily hung back slightly, pointed her wand at Luci's bag and muttered, "Diffindo."

Luci's bag split, and books, parchment, quills and ink all spilled down the stairs. Several ink bottles smashed, and covered books and parchment in ink. Mia had to hand it to Lily – she knew how to cause a delay.

The three of them set to work collecting up all of Luci's stuff, trying not to cut their fingers on the broken glass, and siphoning off ink from the sodden books and rolls of parchment. Almost before they'd started, Peeves was on the scene. The Poltergeist appeared to be magnetically attracted to chaos, and he was soon swooping around the three girls, sending papers flying further down the stairs, all the while giggling gleefully. By the time they finally reached the Entrance Hall, it was almost half an hour after the end of lessons. Mia looked at Lily and nodded slightly. It was time for phase two of their plan.

"Let's go for a walk in the grounds before dinner," Lily proposed.

"Why not after dinner?" Luci asked. "I'm hungry."

"But it's so sunny out there," Lily said, looking out of the oak front doors which were wide open, bathing the Entrance Hall in natural light. They had indeed been fortunate with the weather – it had been bright sunshine all day, and the slight breeze meant that it was warm, but not too hot, in the sun. "I bet it won't be this sunny once we've finished eating. Just a quick walk?"

"Alright," Luci conceded.

"Mia? Are you coming?" Lily asked.

"If you two are, I will," Mia replied, and the three of them headed out into the grounds.

They took the long way round, approaching the chosen party spot – a secluded corner of the lake where there was a natural beach – in such a way that the others had plenty of time to see them coming and hide behind a clump of bushes before Luci could see them. Everything went according to plan, and when they reached the beach, everyone jumped out and yelled, 'surprise!', and the Mac walked forward, grinning,

"We're throwing you a leaving party, Luci."  
Luci was definitely surprised. She looked around at the group – the entirety of the gang had shown up, as well as Ilonka and her friends, and half a dozen first years, mainly Gryffindors and all recruited by Ailie Abercrombie. "You all came for me?" she asked eventually.

"Sure," Mac shrugged, as everyone else gave their noisy assent. "Now why don't you come and give me a hand with the barbeque?"

As Luci followed Mac over to the barbeque, Ilonka came over to Lily, her 'sheep' following.

"Just so we're clear, the only reason I'm not hexing your right now is because this is Luci's party," Ilonka said.

"Ditto," Lily scowled. "So tomorrow we can just go back to hating each other, right?"

"Right," Ilonka agreed, stalking off again.

"I will never understand you and Ilonka, Lils," Louis grinned. "How come you can agree to be civil to each other now, but the rest of the time you're always at each other's throats?"

"Because they're idiots," Hugo grinned. "Besides, if Lily didn't hate Ilonka, where else would she channel all her negative energy?"

Lily thumped him as they all laughed.

Everyone settled down to wait for food off the barbeque – Mac refused to accelerate it magically, supposedly on principle, but everyone suspected it was really because he didn't know how. Whilst they waited, the first, second and third years sat around chatting; played with a fanged frizbee Mac had somehow managed not to get confiscated for another year; and competed on who could skim stones out the furthest into the lake.

A handful of teachers – Professors Longbottom, Cooke and Reuben – showed up just in time to sample the first of the food from the barbeque. After that, everyone sat around eating and chatting, as dusk began to fall.

Luci had started off sitting with Ilonka and co, but when they decided to call it a night, she came over to where Lily, Mia, Hugo, Louis, Zoe and Cassie were sitting – or in Zoe's case, lying with her head in Louis' lap.

"It's funny to think you two hated each other at the beginning of the year," Louis said to Lily and Luci, as he sat absent mindedly playing with Zoe's hair.

"I think that was probably my fault," Luci conceded. "I sort of built up this wall, because... well, it's silly."

"Why?" Lily asked her. "Why did you put up a wall?"

"Because..." Luci sighed. "Because then if you judged me, it didn't matter, because you weren't judging the real me, and if you didn't want to be my friend, then that was okay, because it wasn't the real me you were rejecting."

"That does sound silly," Hugo said.

"Yeah," Luci nodded. "It was, because then I never gave you a chance to see the real me, and judge the real me."

"But now you've let us see the real you, and we do like you," Mia sighed.

"I know it was silly, but I thought that if I acted all unfriendly and grumpy, then at least it was my fault I didn't have any friends," Luci said. "I felt like I could just be nice at any time, and you'd all be my friends... whereas if I was myself, and then you all rejected me, then that would be it."

Mia thought that it kind of did make sense, in a strange way. Having no friends, but entertaining the notion that you could have friends whenever you wanted to was better than just having no friends.

Three days later, and they were all on the Hogwarts Express, heading home for the summer. The gang hadn't got on the train quick enough to secure a compartment all for themselves, so they were spread throughout the train. Mia was sat with Lily, Hugo and Luci – Louis was sitting with Zoe further along the train – and Lily was, once again, describing the bridesmaid's dress she was going to wear to Teddy and Vic's wedding.

"Oh, you're invited to the wedding, by the way," Lily told Mia, as she concluded her description of the exact shade of turquoise the dress was. "I meant to tell you..."

"Lily!" Hugo exploded. "I thought you'd told her ages ago."

"I meant to..." Lily said sheepishly. "Vic told me to invite you when we had the dresses fitted at Easter, but we weren't talking, and then when we were talking again, I just forgot... so, will you come?"

"Sure," Mia said. "I mean, I'll have to ask my parents, but I don't see why not. I've never been to a wedding before."

"Nor have I," Lily said. "Well, I went to Rolf and Luna's – you know, my godparents – but I was only a baby, so I don't really remember it."

Alice and Frankie Longbottom burst into the compartment, both giggling.

"What's up with you two?" Hugo asked with a bemused smile.

"Kieran kissed Frankie!" Alice burst out, and then the two of them resumed their giggling.

"But I thought you both liked Kieran," Mia said – when they'd played truth or dare last summer, Alice and Frankie had both confessed to having a crush on Kieran Finnigan.

Alice shook her head. "Kieran was so last year," she said loftily. "I've moved on."

"So, who do you like now?" Lily asked.

"Andy..." Alice said dreamily.

"Cattermole?" Lily frowned. Andy Cattermole was a Ravenclaw boy in their year, and his older sister, Mary, played Beater on the Gryffindor Quidditch team.

"Yeah," Frankie said, fake-swooning in imitation of her sister.

Lily screwed up her face. "Nope, I don't see it," she said eventually. "Each to her own, I guess."

Alice and Frankie left the compartment. Hugo rolled his eyes. "Girls," he sighed.

Before too long, the train was rolling into London, and coming to a stop on Platform 9¾. Soon, students were spilling off the train, calling out goodbyes and promised to write. Mia stepped off the train and right into Danielle Wood, who was saying goodbye to some fellow second years.

"Oh, sorry, Danielle!" Mia said.

"That's alright," Danielle smiled. "Now then, you better do Gryffindor proud next year – can't have the team falling apart as soon as I leave."

"We'll do you proud," Mia promised. "We've got a legacy to uphold."

"Too right," Danielle grinned, hugging her, and then walking away to find her brothers.

"Well, I guess this is goodbye," Hugo said, turning to Luci.

"You'd better write to us," Mia said, hugging the younger girl.

"I will," Luci promised.

"Luci, I'm sorry I was horrible to you at the beginning of the year," Lily said, taking her turn to hug Luci.

"I'm sorry too," Luci said. "I'm sorry I pushed you all away."

"Friends?" Lily asked.

"Always," Luci smiled.

* * *

And that's it! The End of Year Two. Thank you to everyone who stuck with this story, even through my year-long hiatus. As always, please review and let me know what you thought of it.

Year Three has been finished for almost a year, but I still haven't typed it all up - eight chapters to go! I'm hoping to start posting that soon, probably on a more sustainable posting schedule of two chapters a week. Year Three is a long one - 43 chapters and probably around 75,000 words, so it'll take a while to get through, even at that rate. Be sure to follow me as an author rather than just individual stories so you get a notification when I start posting Year Three.

In the meantime, I have ideas in my head for a collection of one shots called "Four Journeys" which introduce four new characters who will be first years in Year Three, so look out for that too - I'm looking forward to introducing you to JJ, Matilda, Archie and Emma.

~ Nat


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